Giants win shootout with league leaders Cardiff

• Belfast Giants 4 - 3 Cardiff Devils (after OT and penalties)

The Belfast Giants came from behind to take a shootout win over the league-leading Cardiff Devils on Friday night, in their first of back-to-back clashes with the Welsh side.

Andrew Lord's Devils opened their goal account early on courtesy of Jake Morissette's unassisted powerplay effort less than four minutes in.

But Giants forward David Rutherford struck, also unassisted, to beat Cardiff netminder Ben Bowns and bring the sides back level before the first break.

In the second period, the hosts took the lead for the first time with a goal from Sébastien Sylvestre, assisted by Colin Shields and Steve Saviano.

But the third period saw the Devils restore parity after just five minutes, when Patrick Asselin put the equaliser past Jackson Whistle to make it 2-2.

The in-form Rutherford was back to score the Giants third goal of the game though - again unassisted - and his side were once more out in front.

However, the Devils continued to find a way to keep themselves in the game and Mark Richardson took his turn at grabbing an equaliser with just over five minutes to go.

That ultimately saw the game go to overtime - only for the Giants to have what looked like a good sudden death goal from Spiro Goulakos waved off.

The Giants and their fans seemed convinced the goal should stand, but the teams stayed locked at 3-3.

With the game needing to be decided by a penalty shootout, Whistle made three saves before Darcy Murphy scored the winner to seal the extra point for the Giants.

The sides meet to do it all again on Saturday, with face-off at the SSE Arena at 7pm.