Sheffield Steeldogs

Sheffield Steeldogs
City	Sheffield, England
League	NIHL
Division	National League
Founded	2010
Home arena	iceSheffield Capacity: 1,500
Colors	Orange, Black & White
Owner(s)	Tony Smith
Head coach	Jason Hewitt
Captain	Jonathan Kirk
Parent club(s)	Sheffield Steelers
Website	Sheffield Steeldogs
Franchise history
1996 – 2010	Sheffield Scimitars
2010 – present	Sheffield Steeldogs

The Sheffield Steeldogs are a semi professional ice hockey team, based at the iceSheffield complex in Sheffield, England.

History

The club came into existence during the summer of 2010 ^[1] as a replacement for the previous tenants of the iceSheffield rink, the Sheffield Scimitars, after the Scimitars were able to fundraise over a million pounds to revamp the team. ^[2]

The team have played in the English Premier Ice Hockey League from the 2010–2017 season.

After their first season in the EPL, the team achieved a playoff semi-final berth with an 8th-placed finish. The team started the 2011/12 season under the stewardship of Andre Payette, a Canadian forward who was known for his physical presence on the ice rather than his scoring touch, and many in British Ice Hockey had predicted that Sheffield would struggle to a bottom-three finish. Payette's team, made up predominantly of local players and a small band of Eastern European imports, excelled during the 2011/12 season, pulling off several shock wins, including a win against fierce rivals Manchester Phoenix, a strong 3:1 win against Slough Jets and a fantastic 2:0 away shutout at MK Lightning. The Steeldogs had mixed physical hockey with attacking flare to fire their way to a solid top-5 spot and dispelled any notions of a ‘goon hockey’ tag by achieving a semi-final place against Milton Keynes Lightning (Sheffield Steeldogs won the first leg 1:0 at Ice Sheffield).

The Steeldogs went on to finish third in the league after hinting at a title challenge. A two-goal victory of the Basingstoke Bison in their playoff quarter final led to their first appearance at the playoff finals in Coventry. There the Steeldogs met archrivals the Manchester Phoenix in an epic battle that was decided on penalty shots in favour of the Lancashire outfit. The Steeldogs also reached the EPL cup final but were soundly beaten by league champion Guildford Flames as they did the double.

Andre Payette once again led the Steeldogs in 2012/13 but faced a big challenge to repeat the success of the previous season. With young goaltender Ben Bowns making the switch to the EIHL and an aging defence, it proved to be a difficult rebuilding process for the still inexperienced coach. Fans had hoped that Ben Bowns would be re-signed, however he switched to the EIHL becoming the starting net minder for Hull Stingrays.

Club roster 2023-24 ^[3]

(*) Denotes a Non-British Trained player (Import)

Netminders
No.	Nat.	Player	Catches	Date of birth	Place of birth	Acquired	Contract
34		Dmitri Zimozdra	L	(1988-06-08) 8 June 1988 (age 36)	Omsk, Russia	2017 from Sutton Sting	23/24
31		Daniel Crowe	L	(2003-01-03) 3 January 2003 (age 22)	Newcastle, GBR	2022 from Milton Keynes Lightning	23/24

Defencemen
No.	Nat.	Player	Shoots	Date of birth	Place of birth	Acquired	Contract
4		Lewis Bell'	R	(1991-03-05) 5 March 1991 (age 33)	Nuneaton, England	2010 from Sheffield Scimitars	23/24
6		Ben Morgan	R	(1987-10-24) 24 October 1987 (age 37)	Sheffield, England	2011 from the Manchester Phoenix	23/24
8		Tom Dermott	L	(2003-04-03) 3 April 2003 (age 21)	England	2023 from Nottingham Lions	23/24
22		Oliver Turner	L	(2006-01-19) 19 January 2006 (age 18)	England	2022 from Sheffield Scimitars/Sheffield Titans	23/24
43		Sam Cooper	L	(2004-09-12) 12 September 2004 (age 20)	Sheffield, England	2023 from North Jersey Avalanche U18 AAA	23/24
42		Tim Smith	L	(1988-08-04) 4 August 1988 (age 36)	Sheffield, England	2013 from Invicta Dynamos	23/24
56		Lee Haywood	L	(1988-03-20) 20 March 1988 (age 36)	Doncaster, England	2021 from Hull Pirates	23/24
90		Jonathan Kirk Captain C'	L	(1995-08-21) 21 August 1995 (age 29)	Maltby, England	2020 from Hull Pirates	23/24

Forwards
No.	Nat.	Player	Shoots	Date of birth	Place of birth	Acquired	Contract
5		Brady Doxey	R	(2000-09-08) 8 September 2000 (age 24)	Chesterfield, England	2019 from Sutton Sting	23/24
13		Vladislavs Vulkanovs*	R	(1998-02-28) 28 February 1998 (age 26)	Ventspils, Latvia	2022 from Widnes Wild	23/24
14		James Spurr	L	(1989-08-31) 31 August 1989 (age 35)	Sheffield, England	2017 from Sutton Sting	23/24
17		Jason Hewitt	R	(1983-08-28) 28 August 1983 (age 41)	Manchester, England	2021 from Hull Pirates	23/24
19		Cameron Brownley	R	(1997-02-03) 3 February 1997 (age 27)	Sheffield, England	2022 from Hull Seahawks	23/24
20		Jonathan Phillips	R	(1982-07-14) 14 July 1982 (age 42)	Cardiff, Wales	2023 from Sheffield Steelers	23/24
26		Michael Danecko	R	(2004-04-23) 23 April 2004 (age 20)	Czech Republic/England	2021 from Sheffield Scimitars	23/24
26		Tom Palmer	R	(2002-02-01) 1 February 2002 (age 22)	England	2021 from Nottingham Lions	23/24
71		Jack Brammer	R	(2003-07-07) 7 July 2003 (age 21)	Sheffield, England	2022 from Malungs IF	23/24
73		Matt Bissonnette	L	(1992-01-16) 16 January 1992 (age 32)	Beaconsfield, QB, Canada	2021 from Hull Pirates	23/24
75		Ben Cutts	L	(2006-02-04) 4 February 2006 (age 18)	Nottingham, England	2023 from Sheffield Steelhawks/Titans/Scimitars	23/24
81		Charlie Thompson	L	(1996-07-29) 29 July 1996 (age 28)	Rotherham, England	2014 from Sheffield Spartans	23/24
98		Tate Shudra	R	(2004-12-02) 2 December 2004 (age 20)	Rotherham, England	2023 from Leeds Knights/Blackburn Hawks	23/24

Team Staff
No.	Nat.	Name	Acquired	Position	Place of birth	Joined From
		Jason Hewitt	2023–present	Player Head Coach	Sheffield, England
		Steve Weeks	2023–present	Director of Player Development/Asst Bench Coach	Barnsley, England

2022-23 Outgoing

Outgoing
No.	Nat.	Player	Shoots	Date of birth	Place of birth	Leaving For
72		Charlie Henry	L	(2005-02-05) 5 February 2005 (age 19)	Nottingham, England	No team, NIHL
74		Lee Bonner	L	(1997-03-05) 5 March 1997 (age 27)	Hull, England	Hull Seahawks, NIHL
12		Jordan Buesa	L	(2000-10-16) 16 October 2000 (age 24)	Troon, GBR	Glasgow Clan, EIHL

^[4]

2017/18 Season

League

This is the first season that the Sheffield Steeldogs were to participate in the National Ice Hockey League North conference, the Moralee Conference. The season started with player coach Ben Morgan assembling his team and completing the roster with a mix of youth, speed, experience and skill, with the majority of players being a 'home grown player' and being from the Sheffield area. Lewis Bell was named the club's captain at the start of the season with the assistants being Tim Smith and Ashley Calvert.

The first game of the season was away to the last league champions on the former English Premier League, the Telford Tigers. It saw the Steeldogs set the tempo for the season by taking the Tigers to overtime and just falling short in the final period. The dogs would then go unbeaten in the next 11 league games. Andrew Hirst reached a personal milestone in this time by scoring his 100th goal for the Steeldogs in a win against the Billingham Stars on 23 September 2017.

Steeldogs first trip to Blackburn proved to be a thrilling game. The Hawks would take an early lead in the game and it would take the Dogs 59 minutes of the game to score their first goal, Ashley Calvert getting the equaliser in the last minute of regulation. The game then went to overtime when a penalty shot was awarded to the dogs, Milan Kolena scoring the penalty shot and winning the frantic game.

26 November would see the second meeting of the season between the Steeldogs and Hull Pirates, but the first meeting in the league between the sides. The contest that took place in Hull saw the Pirates take the points and hand the Steeldogs their first defeat in the league in regular time.

The Dogs would go December unbeaten and in January would only lose once, to Telford Tigers in a 1-0 loss at home.

February's league campaign would start off slow with a loss away to Whitley Bay. This loss was following a home and away fixture against the Pirates on Friday and Saturday, the Sunday game showed the Steeldogs concede 3 goals in the final period against a Warriors team playing their only game of the weekend. The Steeldogs would win the remaining of their games in February and leave them on top of the Moralee Conference.

March left the Steeldogs with 4 games remaining in the league, Hull Pirates had a game in hand on the Dogs and were only 1 point behind the Dogs in the league. Following 2 wins for the dogs and 3 wins for the Pirates, one of these against 3rd place Telford, the league came down to the final weekend with 2 games against Hull. Both games were a must win for the Dogs, 1 victory for the Pirates would see them take the league. Saturdays game would see the forth shutout in a row for Dmitri Zimozdra as the Dogs would win 1-0. Sundays game was a much more open affair with a 6-4 win for the Dogs which saw them win the league in Hull's rink.

National Cup

The majority of games in December and early January were for the National Cup against Peterborough Phantoms and Hull Pirates. Within this group the Steeldogs managed to win 3 games and lost 4 in regulation and 1 in overtime. This was enough to see the Steeldogs prevail onto the next stage of the cup with the help of some adjusted points between the final Hull and Peterborough game.

The next stage saw the Dogs come up against close rivals Hull in the semi-finals of the cup. The games were a home and away fixture with an aggregate score between the 2 games.

The first game took place in Sheffield and saw the Dogs win 3-2. The Dogs then managed to increase the aggregate score away in Hull and win the overall fixture by winning 3-1, winning the overall competition 6-3 and advancing onto the National Cup final against Swindon Wildcats.

Autumn Cup

The Steeldogs would bail out of the Autumn Cup throughout September and October against Basingstoke Bison and Peterborough Phantoms.

References

1. A New Start » News » Sheffield Scimitars Ice Hockey Club – English Premier League Archived 5 September 2010 at the Wayback Machine . Sheffieldscimitars.co.uk (2010-07-17). Retrieved on 2010-12-13.
2. A New Era for Sheffield » News » Sheffield Scimitars Ice Hockey Club – English Premier League Archived 5 September 2010 at the Wayback Machine . Sheffieldscimitars.co.uk (2010-07-03). Retrieved on 2010-12-13.
3. "Sheffield Steeldogs - Elite Prospects". www.eliteprospects.com.
4. "Team".

External links

• Sheffield Steeldogs Official Website