The Basingstoke Bison bounced back to winning ways on an evening which was more like a fight night than a fright night of Hallowe’en.

The Herd travelled to Swindon knowing a victory would keep alive their hopes of a cup semi-final place and they started the better side at the Link Centre thanks to an early powerplay.

Derek Roehl forced a great save from Stevie Lyle and then Swindon had chances from Aaron Nell and Jan Kostal.

The teams then swapped penalties for the rest of the period, until the final few minutes when the Wildcats’ Sam Bullas clashed with Bison’s Declan Balmer earning each four minutes for roughing.

The Herd opened the scoring, as Roehl touched home a shot from Shaun Thompson on 22 minutes exactly.

The visitors extended their lead thanks to a powerplay strike from man of the match Rene Jarolin with a lovely wrist shot at the back post, after Dan Davies and Vanya Antonov had combined.

The contest then once again boiled over just shy of the midpoint of the game as Bison captain Aaron Connolly traded blows with Swindon player/coach Aaron Nell, while Bullas and Kurt Reynolds also had a disagreement.

Before the game re-started Kyle Smith jumped off the Swindon bench to get involved with the Herd’s Joe Baird.

After much deliberation referee Dan Boardman dismissed Connolly (match for roughing), Nell (game for third man in) and Smith (match for roughing and game for leaving the bench).

Along with this Bullas, Baird, Reynolds and Balmer all picked up roughing penalties which left four Bison players in the sin bin, as Ciaran Long was already serving a penalty before the altercation started.

As the session came to a close, Balmer then checked Tomasz Malasinki from behind and this sparked another fight between Bullas and Balmer.

This earned the pair four minutes for roughing and Balmer picked up 12 extra minutes for the check.

Early in the third period, the Bison had the chance to put the game to bed when they were given a two man advantage, with Bullas and Neil Liddiard in the penalty box.

Long and Jarolin both forced Lyle into good saves, but they failed to beat him.

With less than three minutes left, Jonas Hoog hauled the Wildcats back into the contest, as he fired into the corner and this set-up a frantic finale.

With 1:37 left on the clock, Baird was sent to the sin bin for interference and immediately Swindon pulled their netminder.

This gave them a six-on-four powerplay for the final 97 seconds.

However, the Herd defence held firm with Tomas Hiadlovsky saving from Bullas and Hoog to stop the game into overtime.

As Connolly received a match penalty last night, he will be suspended for this evening’s home game against the high flying Milton Keynes Lightning, which starts at 5.30pm.