Basingstoke Bison 2, Nottingham Panthers 1

CURTIS Cruickshank made a winning return to guard the pipes in a Herd thriller against the visiting Nottingham Panthers on Saturday night.

The netminder turned back the clock to when he last wore a Bison shirt in 2004, with an awesome display - especially in the first 20 minutes, against a side he played for last season.

Cruickshank had to be on top form from the opening face-off as the Panthers players, with their jobs under threat, came roaring out of the blocks.

The Lace City's top goalscorer David Clarke forced the first save after just 10 seconds.

The rest of the period saw Nottingham have the upper hand, helped by three powerplays, but the home defence stood firm as Cruickshank produced a string of saves.

The middle session was a more even affair as the visitors started to pick up penalties while the Bison had a couple of early chances through Blair Manning and the hard-working Greg Wood.

The home side came within inches of opening the scoring after 23 minutes when a thunderbolt shot from Brad Cruikshank came off the pipework with the loudest ping heard in the arena this season.

The final period saw the game really open up as both sides looked for the opening goal, which arrived at 47:02 and went to Nottingham.

A nicely-worked move behind the net between Panthers' Rod Stevens and Matus Petricko set up former Bison Mike Ellis to score from close in.

Soon after, a too-many-men-on-the-ice penalty against the visitors proved costly as the Bison equalised.

A great rush up the arena saw Kevin Bergin feed man-of-the-match Greg Owen. The British forward, finding his route to goal blocked at the near post by Panthers' netminder Evan Lindsey, skated around the back of the net and, to his surprise, was able to sweep the puck in at the other post with the goalie no-where to be seen.

The Herd were now hungry for a winner and that came at 57:34 as Doug Sheppard found Greg Chambers and, from the narrowest of angles, he squeezed the puck into the net at Lindsey's near post.

That was only the start of the drama in the dying minutes. Nine seconds after taking the lead, the Herd's Owen was heading to the sin bin for hooking Petricko.

With the game now in the final two minutes, the home plight got even worse when Mark DeSantis, going for a clearance, sent the puck into the crowd to pick up a delay-of-the-game penalty.

With 76 seconds left on the clock, Nottingham had a two-man advantage and, shortly after play resumed, they pulled their netminder to give them a six-on-three advantage.

However, with Cruickshank not about to let his old team-mates have another goal and Sheppard, Bergin and Eric Braff making sure Nottingham got few clear shots away, a magnificent victory was completed which lifted the Herd off the bottom of the Elite League.

Delighted Bison player-coach Sheppard said: "Curtis has come in and played well for us tonight and all the guys have contributed to a victory we really wanted.

"We were determined tonight not to get beaten, even when we went a goal down."

Scoring, Bison: Owen, Chambers 1+0, Dalmao, Manning, Bergin, Sheppard 0+1; Panthers: Ellis 1+0, Petricko, Stevens 0+1. Shots on goal: Cruickshank 33, Lindsey 35. Penalties: Bison 10min Panthers 14.