By Kris Smith
The Stars start over in Belfast against the recently crowned league winners before returning to Tayside tomorrow to host the Giants for the second leg.
The aggregate winner of this tie and the three others quarter finals will all progress to next weekend’s Playoff Finals Weekend in Nottingham, where the champion will be crowned but for Dundee to make their third appearance at the Elite League’s showpiece event, they must overcome Adam Keefe’s treble chasing Giants side.
Across 10 meetings with Belfast this season, the Stars were only victorious twice but have defeated the Giants in the two most recent matches, both at home and on the road.
Spencer Naas scored three of Stars six goals in those wins but the Northern Irish club have outscored Dundee 43-22 this season.
Last Sunday, it all came down to the final game of the season as Belfast clinched the league title whilst the Stars secured the eighth and final berth for the postseason with a 6-1 Tayside Derby win over Fife Flyers.
Dundee achieved their season-long goal of making the playoffs, which is now the fourth time Marc LeFebvre has led his team into the postseason during his four years on Tayside.
Forward Brendan Harms has led the team in scoring with 59 points (27G, 32A) this year and that was an improvement on his tally of 46 last year with the Stars, whilst captain, Drydn Dow had his best season to date in Dundee.
The Canadian blueliner racked up the most points by a defenseman in the league campaign (47) and produced the fifth most assists in the league (32).
Looking ahead to this weekend’s Quarter-Final matchup, Stars Head Coach, Marc LeFebvre said: “We are here to win.
“Getting into the top eight was always our goal this season and once we are in, then anything can happen with this format.
“We have some experienced guys who have played in this format before and guys who made it to the final four, but also myself, I won it as a player and have been there as a coach, so we have quite a lot of experience within the group of these playoffs.
“Belfast are the league champions for a reason, we know what to expect because it is always a loud building and they will come out hard but we cannot give up at any moment.
“We have to keep going no matter what happens, whether that is a positive or negative thing, in this format you have to keep playing.
“We are looking forward to the challenge and obviously anything can happen, so we will be ready to go from the first face-off.”
With the tie being decided across two sixty-minute games, there is no room for error in any of the 120 minutes and LeFebvre continued: “The most important part is the start to the first game because it is one of those things where anything that can happen in the first leg, could come back to bite you in the second leg.
“That is why you have to play a full game each night and especially in the first match, you cannot give anything away and more so late on in the game, you do not want to give away a late goal as they are the ones that can come back to bite you in the second game.
“We know it is going to be a close competitive game, we have played these guys enough this year to know what to expect from them and what they will bring.
“We have had a couple good results against them recently but it is all to play for in the playoffs.”
Face-off for tonight’s first leg in Belfast is at 7pm and tomorrow’s second leg in Dundee will begin at 5pm.
