The teams had met at least twice before I joined the Comets . To say there was no love lost between them would be like saying Dallas Stars fans have a mild dislike for anything remotely Marchment.

With this in mind, I prepared for the game by expecting to get lit up like a Yugoslavian military base and to take my first penalty for slashing or slew-footing someone. I expected the game to be physical like I'd never seem.

I was only partially right though.

While the game was, without a doubt, physical. It never approached the Donnybrook level that I thought it would. The Comets would settle into a tight checking game that would see the Dress Blues go down early 2-1.

But in spite of being down, they were never completely out of it.