LEEDS KNIGHTS got their 2025-26 season up and running when they bounced back with a maximum points haul against Bristol Pitbulls.
After heading home on the back of an 8-2 win in Bristol on Saturday, the Knights repeated the trick 24 hours later in front of their own fans at The Castle.
The wins extended Leeds’ 100 per cent winning streak over the Pitbulls to 18 games and saw the Knights move up to sixth in the early-season NIHL National standings after four games.
Fin Bradon led the way across both nights in terms of goals, enjoying a 4+2 weekend, while Balint Pakozdi also prospered with 3+2.
Kieran Brown took man of the match on Sunday for five assists, adding to his two goals from the previous night in Bristol.
Arturs Mickevics (2+3), Liam Peyton (2+0), Matt Bissonnette (1+4), Oli Endicott (0+4) and Matt Staudacher (0+3) also got on the board, as did Innes Gallacher (0+2) and Bow Neely (0+1).
Memorably, there were also first-ever NIHL National goals for teenagers Edgars Vengis - on Saturday - and Daragh Spawforth, who found the net on Sunday.
On Sunday, the Knights broke the deadlock in the eighth minute when Peyton drove down the left before scoring from a tight angle.
Pakozdi doubled the lead from a rebound at 13.11 before Bradon showed great speed and skill to race the length of the ice before backhanding over the goalie’s right shoulder to make it 3-0 at 22.14.
It was 6-0 after 40 minutes, after further power play goals from Mickevics and Bradon before the halfway mark were enhanced by a Matt Bissonnette strike at 39.46.
Bakozdi doubled his tally just seven seconds into the third before one of the loudest cheers of the night came when 17-year-old Spawforth pounced on a rebound to fire home from close range to make it 8-0 at 44.59.
Bristol grabbed late consolations through Sean Morris and Jacob Bryceland..
On Saturday, it was the Pitbulls who struck first when an odd bounce of the boards saw the puck fall to Josh Batch, who scored from close range with just 1.55 on the clock.
But Bradon levelled on the next shift for the Knights, who ended the period 4-1 to the good, Kieran Brown breaking clear after neat work from Bissonnette for a shorthanded marker at 6.23 before firing through traffic into the top left-hand corner just over four minutes later.
Another shorthanded strike - this time from Bradon at 14.47 - gave the Knights a firm grip on the game.
Vengis then made it a night to remember personally, too, when he was in the right place at the right time to fire home a rebound in the 28th minute before Pakozdi scored from close range at 37.38 on the power play.
Peyton found the net at 44.16 thanks to a sweet move involving Mickevics and Endicott, the pair combining again to enable the Latvian forward to make it 8-1 at 53.14.
Bristol grabbed a late consolation through Jack Bricknell’s 59th-minute power play strike.
