Challenge Cup | Fife Flyers 3 Glasgow Clan 4 [PSO]

The Premier Sports sponsored Glasgow Clan had to go through 65 minutes of open play before 10 rounds of penalty shots to see out a difficult road game against the Fife Flyers on the opening night of the season.

Rasmus Tirronen was backed up by Dan Norton in the Clan net with Liam Souliere, Rylan Schwartz, and new signing Kaleb Pehrson sitting out the first 2026/27 Challenge Cup game.

Fife had the first chance of the game as they emerged on Tirronen’s net with a three-on-two advantage with Zachary Power dragging a shot to the backdoor from the edge of the crease but a great reflex kick save from the Finn kept his attempt out.

Steven Seigo put his body on the line to block a pass across the slot for the Flyers later in the period while Matt Spencer dominated the Clan defensive-zone in a fairly quiet opening period.

Mika Partanen found a breakthrough before the first break though as he slammed a shot from the right side into the Clan net just six seconds into the first powerplay of the night.

In the second period, Glasgow drew level after some nice interchange off the faceoff dot with Tristin Langan and Matt Spencer moving the puck quickly before zipping a pass to Deven Sideroff who snapped home the equaliser with a first-time blast.

Kyle Watson was then denied brilliantly as Fife attempted to open up the Clan defence with a cross-ice pass and a quick release from Watson but a routine slide across his line allowed Tirronen to make an impressive stop.

With the score tied after 40 minutes, both teams set out with a vengeance to decide the tie in the third period as Victor Bjorkung struck the post after just 60 seconds before Langan did the same at the other end on the powerplay shortly after.

Juho Rautanen put the Clan in front with a great shot from the blue line in the final 10 minutes, which incited Fife, particularly Garet Hunt, to ramp up the physicality in search of a response.

Hunt seized his opportunity to throw his hands around when Cole Kodsi got tangled up with Evan Dougherty after the whistle as the Flyers’ captain ganged up on Glasgow’s #67 and drew one of five roughing penalties handed out in the melee.

David Madsen then doubled the Clan advantage as Hunt barrelled into Mick Messner, opening up a lane for the Dane who picked his spot expertly with a needle-threading shot.

The hosts clawed their way back into the game in the final five minutes with Cameron Hough netting a second before Xander Lamppa got a hefty redirect on Bjorkung’s shot to tie the game at three on the powerplay.

The game was then forced to overtime, where neither side could produce a game-winning goal, meaning penalty shots would decide how the points would fall.

Goals from Bjorkung and Zachary Power, and Sideroff and Cade Neilson respectively in the first set of penalties saw the tie go onto sudden-death.

Five straight misses for the Flyers, including Partanen losing the puck before he could even shoot it, allowed Sideroff’s second successful shot of the shootout to be the decider as Glasgow took the extra point at the end of a very long night.