THE Basingstoke Bison opened their pre-season campaign with a thrilling 5-4 victory over the visiting Milton Keynes Lightning, with the winner coming in the final minute.

The opening 20 minutes saw no goals, but it was feisty affair as tempers flared.

The second session saw the Herd open the scoring at 26:04 as man-of-the-match Stuart Mogg’s blue line shot found a way past former Bison goalie Dean Skinns.

Leigh Jamieson levelled things at 37:03, but 20 seconds later Ciaran Long restored the home side’s lead.

MK drew first blood in the final session, as their man-of-the-match Lewis Hook scored the first of his hat-trick.

The Bison once again took the lead, as Ryan Watt tapped in at the far post from Tomas Karpov at 46:26.

Hook again levelled things as he converted a pass from Bobby Chamberlain.

The Herd made it 4-3 on the powerplay from Joe Rand, as he scored just five seconds into the man advantage.

Hook completed his hat-trick to tie the game again, before Rand deflected in Joe Baird’s blue line shot with 46.8 seconds left on the clock.

In a tense finale MK were given a powerplay with 33 seconds to go and pulled their goalie, but were unable to grab an equaliser.

The Bison are next in action on Saturday (6.30pm) when Guildford Flames are the visitors in their next pre-season game.

Also at Saturday game, there will be a bucket collection for the Little Princess Trust, a charity close to the heart of Bison forward Ryan Watt.

The Little Princess Trust provides real hair wigs to boys and girls that have sadly lost their own hair through cancer treatment.

Watt has been growing his hair for the past two years as it needs to be over seven inches long to donate to the charity, He will have it cut by the Herd's own hairdresser Kurt Reynolds before the first home league game.