All smiles for Jokerit. September 8 round-up

The clash of the KHL newboys ended in a decisive 3-0 victory for Jokerit over Sochi. A combination of great goaltending from Riku Helenius, who made 29 saves including a fine block with an outstretched pad to deny Mikhail Anisin, and clinical finishing from the Finnish forwards proved to be good enough to subdue Sochi. Linus Omark opened the scoring in the first period, and Jokerit may have felt the margin should have been greater at the intermission. But Niko Kapanen eased home nerves when he wrapped up a neat power play move midway through the second and Niklas Hagman found the net for the third game in a row to seal the victory. SKA storms on It’s three wins from three in St. Petersburg with Dinamo Minsk becoming SKA’s latest victim – but a 5-2 scoreline does a slight disservice to the Belarusians. SKA benefitted from two empty net goals – one of them short-handed – to secure the win after being outshot 36-31 by the visitor. Ilya Kovalchuk scored twice, includi ...