THE BASINGSTOKE Buffalo warmed up for their promotion play-off weekend against the Slough Jets with an excellent 6-3 win at the Cardiff Devils.

The first leg of the Buffalo’s semi-final clash with the Jets is at the Hangar on Saturday (6.45pm), with the return at the Basingstoke Arena on Sunday (6.30pm).

Slough are going for the treble, as they have already won the National Ice Hockey League South East Two crown and beat Basingstoke in the final of the NIHL South Two League Cup.

The Berkshire side will certainly start as favourites, but the Buffalo team, which is an excellent blend of youth and experience, will not make things easy for them.

They finished level on points with South West Two champions Bristol Pitbulls, but lost the title on head-to-head results between the top two teams.

The Pitbulls were the only side to beat Basingstoke during their league campaign, which the Buffalo wrapped up in Cardiff last Saturday.

In Wales on Saturday, Ryan Sutton gave the visitors the lead from Sam Dollin’s pass and then Matt Lawday doubled the advantage.

Cardiff opened their account as Giacomo Raffaeilli scored, but Daniel Lackey, who went on to collect four points on the night, restored the two-goal lead.

In a high-scoring opening period, Cardiff netted their second from Rhys Harding, but Lackey scored again to make it 4-2 at the buzzer, assisted by Francesco Tambellini and Mark Pitts, the latters third of four helpers on the night.

The Buffalo scored their last two goals in the space of 13 seconds in the second session.

The first came from captain Neil Leary, followed by man-of-the-match Stuart Mogg.

Cardiff’s Harding scored the final goal of the game three minutes later.

Former Buffalo and Bison player Elliott Dewey is in action this weekend for Invicta Dynamos in the NIHL One South play-off final.

The Basingstoke-based player will hope he can help the Dynamos beat the Wightlink Raiders, who also include a number of former Herd players.