LAST year Kinross and Cavaliers’ respective Royal Hotel Cup campaigns came down to one game, their final group stage match-up, which the former thrillingly won in the final over to progress to the semi-finals.

For the students, it’s Groundhog Day.

Kinross take on Cavaliers tonight at Wade Park, and while it might not be pool A’s - or Cavaliers’ for that matter - final preliminary clash, it is a do-or-die game for the students, and will have a huge impact on which of the two sides qualifies for the final four.

Win, and Kinross will all but buy themselves a ticket to the semi-finals, unless either Molong or Cavaliers score an upset win over CYMS.

Lose, and the students are gone.

“It is a must win game,” Kinross coach Andrew Litchfield said.

“But I think that’s actually good for us. We were in this situation last year against Cavaliers and won, and that was a really good game of cricket actually.

“I think [tonight] will be close as well. For us I think it’s just about taking our chances.”

Kinross will be without opening batsmen Charlie Litchfield and Peter Crisp, somewhat nullified by all-rounder Sam Nicholls’ return, but the students’ mentor said his side is full of confidence after a strong win over Molong last week.

“It helps having someone like Sammy come back in, but we’re pretty confident at the moment,” Andrew Litchfield said.

“All the guys are bowling well, and we’re batting pretty well too. They got a great score against Centrals last Saturday, so we just need to ride our luck a bit and back ourselves.

“We always field well, but we need to take all our chances against Cavaliers, considering the calibre of batsmen they have.”

Tonight’s clash starts at 6.30pm.