THE BASINGSTOKE Bison opened their league campaign with a 7-4 success over the visiting Peterborough Phantoms.

The Herd took a deserved lead into the first break, thanks to Adam Harding, who scored with a nice wrist shot after good work from Aidan Doughty.

The home side increased their lead to 3-0 by 27:43, after Alex Sampford scored from close range after great spadework by George Norcliffe.

Their third goal came from man of the match Elliott Dewey as he finished off a lovely shorthanded move, for his first goal of the season. This also involved Ashley Tait and Filip Martinec.

Peterborough then hauled themselves back into the contest thanks to their man of the match Glen Billing.

Then thanks to some soft penalty calls the visitors scored twice on the powerplay from Billing and Jarvis Hunt to tie the game.

Early in the final period, the Herd scored twice in the space of 42 seconds to take a 5-3 lead.

This was after Harding converted a nice pass from Dewey at the back post, while a slick passing move involving Tait and Paul Petts saw Hallam Wilson score his first of the campaign.

Martinec capped his home debut with the Bison’s sixth goal, assisted by Dewey and Wilson.

As the game entered the final two minutes the visitors pulled their netminder and Peterborough’s Will Weldon netted.

This was as good as it got, as Alex Roberts fired the puck into the empty net, beating the final buzzer by a second.

In other games involving Basingstoke teams at the weekend, the under-14 Bison had an impressive 12-0 win at Invicta to make it four wins out of four so far.

Leilo Bellamy led the way with 4+3, Felix Hemmings-Maher grabbed a brace and there were also goals for Harrison Hallin, Leo Battarbee, Ethan Wiltshire, Finlay Spearing, Charles Gaskin and Ellis Austin.

The under-12 Bison saw off visiting Cardiff with a 10-3 success.

Hugo Skinns topped the scoring with 2+3, while Ethan Hills and Lewis Battarbee also netted braces. There were single goals for Ethan Lewis, Aiden Lamey, Oliver Hagedorn and Reggie Howe.

The under-16 Bison lost out 5-3 at Chelmsford with Leilo Bellamy scoring twice and Oliver Hemming-Maher getting the other.