Dundee Stars ice hockey playcaller Jeff Hutchins had much to ponder on the long road trip back from England.
The narrow 2-1 defeat, despite being 1-0 ahead after three minutes, at basement rivals Coventry Blaze on Sunday sees the Tayside team anchored at the foot of the table, four points behind the rest.
And time is running out to sign a new player and to qualify for the end-of-season play-offs.
To do that Stars must make the top eight and Dundee must now make a late surge.
They have 23 points from 36 games with only three regulation wins (after 60 minutes) to their credit and are four adrift of Coventry who have played a game more but have won 10 in regulation time.
Edinburgh Capitals, who snapped an 11-game losing streak with a 4-3 home success over Hull Stingrays on Sunday, have 28 points from 36 games and occupy the final play-off spot.
Fife are sixth and their penalty shoot-out success over Belfast Giants at Rosslyn Street on Sunday takes them to 34 points from 37 games.
Then there is a massive gap to fifth-placed Cardiff Devils who have 48 points from 35 games. Effectively, the top five are out of sight.
The position could become clearer after next weekend. Tomorrow Coventry host Nottingham Panthers then Stars travel to Sheffield Steelers on Saturday and entertain leaders Braehead Clan, on Sunday.
Hull visit Braehead on Saturday while Fife host Cardiff and, on Sunday, Coventry visit Cardiff with Edinburgh hosting Sheffield and Fife at Hull.
Sadly, Dundee’s situation is a far cry from last season when the Tayside team celebrated winning their first major trophy, the Gardiner Conference, and finished third in the league.
* Dundee Tigers celebrated a 5-3 win over Solway Sharks which sees them into the semi-finals of the Scottish Cup.
Goals by Steven Turnbull after 51 minutes and Richy Fox less than three minutes from time finally halted Sharks.
Tigers will meet either Moray or Edinburgh Capitals, the holders and last season’s Grand Slam champions, in the final four.
Tigers’ player/coach Ian Carstairs was pleased with the performance as Tigers have major injury problems and, indeed, lost Graeme Carstairs in the warm-up after an injury he collected in Saturday’s 14-0 win over Belfast Giants was aggravated.
Ian Carstairs said: “The Solway game was a good one and both teams created plenty of chances.
“We were 1-0 down early on but we closed the game out late-on.”