MARK HURTUBISE again showed why he is so highly-rated in the Elite League with two late goals as Edinburgh Capitals skated to within a point of a play-off slot with a valuable 4-2 away win at Newcastle Vipers last night.
Capitals now only need a point from either their home game against Manchester Phoenix tomorrow or at play-off rivals Hull Stingrays on Sunday.
Hull battled to a 6-5 penalty shot win at Manchester last night but must win their final two games and
hope Capitals are pointless.
It's now down to the wire but Doug Christiansen was buoyed by last night's welcome win when the Capitals had to come from behind before taking the points.
Christiansen, the club's director of hockey, said: "Any win on the road is a good win but we can't worry about what Hull are doing, we have to worry about ourselves.
"We have a three-point cushion over Hull and we only need a point and we'll be going for it tomorrow.
"We have to limit what Tony Hand and David Beauregard do, but Manchester are a very good team.
"They've got the better of us this season and they are really hard to play. We'll have to be at our best and be really focused if we want to take the points."
Christiansen will have a full roster to pick from as all the players emerged unscathed from last night's clash on Tyneside.
He praised Hurtubise and also Pasi Raitanen, Capitals' No.1 netminder. Ritchie Lawson was the busier netminder dealing with 48 shots while Raitanen dealt with 24 but the Finnish stopper made some telling saves at the right time.
Christiansen added: "Newcastle came out better than we did early on and they were loose as they had already qualified for the play-offs.
"It was frustrating but we began to play in the second period and earned our reward.
"Mark played great as he has for us this season and Pasi made some big saves for us at the right time."
Vipers took a first-period lead thanks to a single strike from former Capitals hitman Jeff Hutchins, who netted his 26th of the season in the seventh minute.
It was the second session in which Capitals turned the game in their favour as skipper Martin Cingel levelled in the 29th minute with his 29th goal of the season and then on the powerplay, Kyle Horne's fifth of the campaign hit the rigging at 34min 42sec.
However, there was a shock for the visitors within 42 seconds of the third period when top marksman Derek Campbell equalised with his 21st of the season.
Capitals dug deep and Hurtubise showed exactly why he has been in the top-five points gatherers so far this season with his 29th and 30th goals of the season scored in four minutes.
Capitals scored once from three power play chances and the win sets them up for the weekend.
Christiansen said: "We want our fans to be loud and proud and enjoy tomorrow's game.
"We believe we can make the play-offs and it would be fantastic if we could make it for the second year running.
"We don't want to go to Hull looking for a win but, if we have to, then we will.
"We'll do the best we can in both games and see what happens but last night's result was a big one for us."
At Manchester, Stingrays kept themselves alive by winning a penalty shoot-out over Phoenix with skipper Jeff Glowa scoring the winning shot.
The full article contains 612 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
