Ak Bars humbles leader, Avangard wins eight in a row. November 17 round-up
Alexander Radulov’s hat-trick led Ak Bars to an impressive 5-2 victory over SKA as the league leader suffered a fourth successive loss on the road. Avangard’s hot streak continued with an overtime verdict against Sochi securing an eighth successive win. The Hawks were among four OT winners, with Kunlun Red Star, Sibir and Avtomobilist also triumphant in the extras. Admiral bounced back from its loss at CSKA to defeat Dynamo Moscow in the day’s other game.
Damir’s double defeats Sochi
Avangard Omsk 5 HC Sochi 4 OT (2-3, 1-0, 1-1, 1-0)
Both these teams changed their head coaches already this season, and for both it has had a positive effect. Under Mikhail Kravets, Avangard compiled a seven-game winning streak that banished memories of dropping out of the top eight. Sochi, meanwhile, enjoyed back-to-back wins over Lokomotiv and Salavat Yulaev under new head coach Sergei Svetlov. However, the visitor remains stuck at the foot of the standings.
While Avangard had the luxury of an unchanged roster, Sochi had to replace the injured Joe Morrow on defense. That meant a KHL debut for 20-year-old Sergei Kosovets. Danil Avershin, Artyom Ivanyuzhenkov and Donat Stalnov returned up front and young Artemy Pleshkov continued in goal.
Avershin celebrated his comeback with the opening goal, converting the first power play of the game in the fifth minute. That ushered in a high-scoring first period, although there was something of a hiatus as Avangard got its offense rolling. In the 17th minute, sustained pressure on Pleshkov saw Damir Sharipzyanov tie the game and kickstarted a goal rush. Sochi regained the lead 42 seconds later when Artyom Nikolayev redirected a Brandon Gormley shot. Sergei Popov extended the advantage, but Alex Broadhurst gave the host a lift when he pulled one back a second before the hooter.
At the start of the second period, a foul by Ivanyuzhenkov saw Reid Boucher tie the scores after just nine seconds on his team’s first power play. That was the only scoring in the stanza, with Avangard starting to get on top. The third frame also brought a quick goal, with Fyodor Malykhin’s individual skill putting the home team in front for the first time.
From that point on, it seemed that the Hawks would take the points with little difficulty. Avangard was finding it easier to create scoring chances up until the 50th minute, but could not extend its lead. Gradually, Sochi got back into the game. Avangard faced a couple of tough shifts, with Vasily Demchenko put to work to preserve that slender lead. Ultimately, he was beaten just 12 seconds before the hooter when Nikita Zorkin sent the game to overtime.
It was the fifth time in the past six games that Sochi had managed to secure at least one point. However, the visitor could not sail away with both. Sharipzyanov got his second of the night to secure Avangard’s eighth win in a row.
Motormen back in pole position
Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg 4 Metallurg Magnitogorsk 3 OT (1-1, 1-1, 1-1, 1-0)
The Motormen tightened their grip on top spot in the East after edging a hard-fought battle against Metallurg. The visitor was just a point behind going into Thursday’s game and had ambitions of regaining the summit for itself. However, Curtis Valk’s overtime goal gave the home team the verdict.
In front of a sell-out crowds, the teams produced a rollercoaster of a game. Metallurg made the better start but struggled to turn that into clear-cut chances. However, in the first 10 minutes, visiting goalie Eddie Pasquale was a virtual spectator. It was no surprise when Philippe Maillet put the visitor ahead after 15 minutes, taking advantage of a generous amount of space in the Avto zone. However, the response was almost immediate with Stepan Khripunov setting up Stephane Da Costa to send the teams into the intermission deadlocked.
In the second session, Avtomobilist dominated, outshooting Magnitka 19-4. Unusually, though, in form forward Brooks Macek could not find his scoring range. It was left to Valk to give the home team its first lead of the game. However, Metallurg recovered to tie it up on a power play when Andrei Chibisov reacted fastest to a rebound.
In the third period, the pendulum swung once more. The break seemed to recharge Metallurg, and its early pressure was rewarded when Pavel Akolzin fired in a shot that deflected off Alexei Vasilevsky and into the home net. In response, Khripunov tied the scores in the 56th minute, scoring on a delayed penalty to take the game to overtime.
Brendan Leipsic was the key figure in the extras, but not in a good way. His penalty handed Avtomobilist the platform from which to dictate the play, and Valk had the final word to give his team a fifth straight win.
Beck sinks former team-mates
Dinamo Minsk 1 Sibir Novosibirsk 2 OT (1-0, 0-1, 0-0, 0-1)
Dinamo’s previous two games yielded 22 goals. However, the Bison allowed 15 of them, suggesting a need to rethink the team’s approach somewhat. Against Sibir, Craig Woodcroft’s men managed to keep the score down and gained a point after a 1-1 tie. However, the Belarusians could not escape a third successive loss.
Vladimir Alistrov opened the scoring for Dinamo in the fourth minute, converting the first power play of the game. However, hopes of another goal glut quickly withered: it was the only goal of the opening stanza, and neither side created all that many big opportunities thereafter.
Early in the second period, Sibir had to kill another penalty when Vyacheslav Osnovin was called for hooking. This time, the visitor survived and later in the session Osnovin himself tied the scores. Sibir went on to have the better of the third period, but could not find a winning goal. That had to wait until overtime when Taylor Beck potted the winner against his former club.
Radulov’s hat-trick inspires Ak Bars
Ak Bars Kazan 5 SKA St. Petersburg 2 (1-0, 2-1, 2-1)
Alexander Radulov’s hat-trick handed Ak Bars an impressive win over the league leader. SKA, beaten in its last three road games, hoped that a 7-2 drubbing of Dinamo Minsk drew a line under its recent struggles. However, former Petersburg head coach Oleg Znarok masterminded a heavy defeat for his former club.
This was the kind of performance expected of Ak Bars at the start of the season. Znarok’s all stars have struggled to live up to their billing, setting the rumor mill into overdrive. Today, though, the Kazan team did its talking on the ice – with Radulov delivering the keynote address.
In the first period, both teams showed plenty of enterprise but there were few clear chances. Ak Bars got the only goal when Ilya Safonov’s hard work handed Kirill Petrov the opportunity to unleash his wrist shot and beat Dmitry Nikolayev.
Arguably, SKA slightly shaded the play in the first period and the visitor certainly showed no signs of giving up on this one. In the second period, the table toppers were impressive, with Nikita Gusev at the heart of much of their best play. And it was Gusev who tied the scores in the 34th minute with a superb wrister that clipped the inside of the post on its way into the net.
Next came a fight between Dmitry Voronkov and Nikita Komarov, with Voronkov getting the win for the home side before both players sat out major penalties. Late in the frame, Radulov made his contribution. First, he took Alexander Burmistrov’s pass to restore the Ak Bars lead, then Radulov profited from Voronkov’s surge down the ice to make it 3-1. Voronkov’s sparring partner, Komarov, was less fortunate: he was ejected from the game moments later after a dangerous knee on Yevseyev.
In the third period, SKA got one back through Igor Ozhiganov. Gusev’s assist takes him to six (2+4) points in two games, but there was no win for him today. Instead, Safonov made it 4-2 before assisting on Radulov’s hat-trick goal in the closing minutes.
Dynamo suffers fifth straight loss
Dynamo Moscow 1 Admiral Vladivostok 2 (0-0, 0-2, 1-0)
Admiral’s impressive form this season showed that it could survive adversity with a battling win at Dynamo. For the Blue-and-Whites, though, a blip is in danger of becoming a slump: this was a fifth straight loss for Alexei Kudashov’s men.
The visitor’s rise in the Eastern Conference was one of the talking points of the season so far. However, defeat at CSKA earlier this week suggested to some that the Sailors might be in danger of drifting back into the doldrums after a successful run. This win over Dynamo suggests that writing off Admiral may well prove premature.
True, Dynamo can point to long spells of dominance before the opening goal of the game. However, Admiral’s supporters will respond with the old advice about needing to take chances as well as make them. The visitor did not greatly extend Ilya Konovalov in the home net, but when it got its first power play, Alexander Shevchenko opened the scoring in the 35th minute. Late in the middle frame, Evgeny Lisovets doubled the lead and from then on, Dynamo was chasing the game.
That pursuit proved to be in vain. An interference call on Andrei Nikonov disrupted Dynamo’s plans for a fast start in the third and enabled to Admiral to get its gameplan established. It wasn’t always pretty, but it was effective at keeping danger away from Nikita Serebryakov’s net. The visiting goalie got some help in the 53rd minute, when a bench challenge saw Dynamo lose a goal to interference on the netminder. Dmitry Rashevsky then scored a legitimate marker for the home team, but it was too late to save the game.
Dragons singe Loko in shoot-out
Lokomotiv Yaroslavl 2 Kunlun Red Star 3 SO (0-1, 1-1, 1-0, 0-0, 0-1)
The Dragons bounced back from a disappointing loss at home to Torpedo and grabbed a shoot-out verdict in Yaroslavl. For the home team, looking to close on the top two, this was a big disappointment: Igor Nikitin’s team has a good record against Kunlun and would have anticipated bringing an end to its losing streak. Instead, it suffered a fourth defeat in a row.
All four goals came on the power play. The first went to KRS, profiting from the first penalty of the game after defending resolutely in the face of some intense home pressure. Alex Riche broke the deadlock in the 16th minute as Maxim Shalunov sat in the box.
Early in the second period, the Dragons took their first penalty of the evening and Loko needed little time to tie the scores. Now Shalunov turned scorer just 22 seconds after Cory Kane went to the box. The Railwaymen still had the better of the play, but struggled to beat ex-Loko netminder Alexei Murygin, despite two more power plays in the second session. Then, late in the frame, Tyler Wong restored Red Star’s lead.
The third period saw even more Lokomotiv dominance, with the home team firing in 20 shots at Murygin. Only one of them found the target, though, with Rushan Rafikov tying it up in the 51st minute on yet another power play. That was the last PP and the last goal of the game; the outcome was settled in a shoot-out. Stepan Nikulin scored first for Loko, but Jack Rodewald and Josh Nicholls responded to give Red Star the verdict.
