Fife Flyers coach Todd Dutiaume looked back at the last three months and said: “This is some story.”
At 11pm on January 5 this year Flyers were bottom of the Elite League table, the 17th time this season they had looked up at the rest.
Since then the Kirkcaldy club have roared up the league to occupy seventh position at the end of the regular season, with a scintillating late run that has attracted full houses at their Rosslyn Street rink.
Now, in the club’s 75th year, they are in the final four at Nottingham for the first time.
In the Lace City the Flyers will meet Belfast Giants, the newly-crowned league champions, in Saturday afternoon’s opening play-off semi-final.
Dutiaume insisted his team are not going to the Midlands just for the ride and declared: “We want the title.”
He points to the club’s 6-2 victory over Giants at Kirkcaldy on March 15 as proof the Northern Irish side can be beaten.
Dutiaume said: “I’m a very happy man. We’re in our 75th anniversary year and we’ve made it to Nottingham for the first time.
“We’re still taking one game at a time as we have done since early January.
“We’re not thinking ahead of Belfast on Saturday at 1pm. It’s a good slot as it gives you more time to recover if you make the final but we’re not thinking about that, only about Belfast.”
He added: “We beat Belfast recently and this is a one-off game in which anything can happen.
“The main thing is that we are there, the guys are happy, they are playing well and the fans are happy.”
Sheffield Steelers and Coventry Blaze play the second-leg of their play-off quarter-final tonight and Braehead Clan await them in Nottingham in the other semi-final.
The final is on Sunday, also at Nottingham.