Punters were treated to a tense and tough game of hockey, which was fuelled by 2015 North Star Geordie Wudrick’s return to Newcastle but wearing Canberra’s colours.

Wudrick was key to Canberra’s 4-3 shootout win against the North Stars. He scored the game-levelling goal and made the winning shot in the shootout.

“I was actually really pleased with everything except the result,” North Stars coach Andrew Petrie said of Sunday’s game.

“I thought we played a very highly disciplined game... we adhered to our systems extremely well. The breakdowns we had were again situational, not individual, where things fell apart. We had a guy trip over on one and a bouncing puck through some legs on another.” 

Newcastle import Connor McLaughlin scored first in Sunday’s game. The North Stars held on to its 1-0 lead until mid-way through the second period.

North Stars import Brandon Wong broke the stalemate, but just seconds later Canberra retaliated to even the game 2-2.

It was a similar story in period three where Canberra scored to take the lead but the North Stars equaled. The equalising goal came from David Ferrari – his first ever in six AIHL seasons.

Despite many tries at breaking the tie, the game finished and went to a shoot out, which the Brave won.

The loss came after the North Stars dished up one of the greatest AIHL defeats so far in 2016. The North Stars travelled to Liverpool on Saturday to face the Sydney Ice Dogs. The North Stars won 9-1.

Imports Scott Swiston, Wong and McLaughlin each scored in the first period, as did Pat Nadin. McLaughlin would go on to score two more goals in period three for a hat trick.

Robert Malloy racked up a goal in period three, rounding out the total number of players to score against the Ice Dogs to five.

“The Ice Dogs they're a much better team than a 9-1 scoreline would reflected,” Petrie said. “I expect them to give a lot of teams a lot of trouble this year.”

The North Stars travel to Victoria this weekend to face the Melbourne Mustangs.