THE Basingstoke Bison suffered the heartbreak of losing a penalty shoot-out to visiting title rivals the Peterborough Phantoms on Saturday night.

It was always going to be a tough ask with the Herd minus their top goal scorer Richard Bordowski, due to injury.

However, the team battled on without him twice coming back to tie the game, before losing it 3-2 after penalty shots.

The first 20 minutes saw no goals and few clear-cut chances.

The second session opened with the home side dominating as Ashley Tait, man of the match Adam Jones and Alex Sampford all forcing Marr into saves.

Peterborough’s Petr Stepanek then tried to push the puck home by the post, but Alex Mettam was having none of it.

Just past the middle mark of the period, Mettam was again at his best to deny Corey McEwen from close range.

The game was finally broken open at 32:31 as man of the match Ales Padelek scored from an acute angle at the back post.

The home side hit back looking for an equaliser and Josh Kelly’s pass right across the crease was met by fellow defenceman Tom Ralph, but his wrister of a shot only found the pads of Marr.

The Herd then looked to level things as man of the match Adam Jones’ blue line shot from the right point was directed home by Russ Cowley.

The puck going into the net and out of a hole at the back of it.

Play continued and the Phantoms’ Scott Robson released Martins Susters and at the other end of the rink Mettam made the save before play stopped.

At this point, linesman Andrew Strain told referee Blaine Evans about the goal and after a discussion with the goal judge and players it was awarded and the game clock rewound back to the time of the goal 38:23.

The Herd so nearly took the lead before the second buzzer, as with 29 seconds left a George Norcliffe shot deflected off Peterborough’s Scott Robson into the goal crease and Marr produced a great reflex save.

The visitors opened the final session the better and took the lead again.

A defence splitting pass from Callum Buglass left Padelek all alone on the Bison blue line and he made no mistake with a clinical finish.

As the final period went on the home side piled on the pressure but could not find a way past Marr.

With just over two minutes left in the contest, Padelek broke away again, but Mettam denied him his hat-trick.

With 68 seconds remaining on the clock the Bison called a time out.

It did the trick as with exactly a minute left on the clock, the Herd scored the equaliser.

Russ Cowley finishing off a move which involved Adam Harding and Jones.

With no further scoring, the game went into overtime, which the Herd had the better of with Michal Klejna, Harding and Norcliffe all forcing saves out of Mettam.

At the other end of the rink Padelek and Susters tested Mettam.

With no addition to the score the match was decided by a penalty shoot-out with the visitors shooting first in the best of the three series.

Susters slotted home the opening shot and then Klejna could not believe his eyes as Marr somehow falling backwards stopped his effort.

Glen Billing saw his shot saved, before Harding with some superb stick work beat Marr to tie up the shoot-out.

Padelek was then denied, which gave Cowley the chance to win the game roared on by the home crowd, but he was unable to find the target.

The shoot-out moved to sudden death, with the Bison now going first.

Harding fired wide and McEwen lost control of the puck as he was about to shoot

Klejna then missed with his second attempt, as did Susters as the tension grew.

Alex Sampford tried to find a way past Marr, but his shot was gloved wide.

It was left to Padelek to win the game as he roofed the puck high into the net.

It was a shame that after all their hard work the Bison were not rewarded with two points instead of just the one.

The Bison will now look to bounce back to winning ways this evening, when they travel to Milton Keynes to take on the Thunder.