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Winning streaks for Avangard, Severstal. January 17 round-up
Both Avangard and Severstal recorded their sixth successive victories, albeit in contrasting fashion. The Hawks beat CSKA 4-1, with Reid Boucher scoring a club record 62nd point along the way. Severstal, meanwhile, played out 65 goalless minutes before halting Traktor in a shoot-out. Elsewhere, SKA scored six on Amur, Avtomobilist was too strong for Admiral, and Kunlun avenged yesterday’s defeat in Minsk.
Boucher sets new club record
Avangard Omsk 4 CSKA Moscow 1 (3-0, 0-1, 1-0)
An entertaining game saw two penalty shots missed, Reid Boucher set a club scoring record for Avangard and CSKA suffer a third successive defeat. The Hawks owed much to goalie Pavel Khomchenko, who made 39 saves. At the other end, CSKA allowed four goals on just 19 shots.
That clinical finishing came despite the absence of Vladimir Tkachyov. The home forward is second in team scoring, narrowly behind Boucher, but had to sit this one out due to injury. Injury and suspension also affected Avangard’s defense, with just six blue-liners available today.
The teams paid tribute to Alexander Popov. He was a legendary figure in Omsk hockey before ending his playing career at CSKA, where he is now on the coaching staff. His jersey was raised to the arena ceiling in a pre-game ceremony.
On the ice, CSKA was close to opening the scoring when Fredrik Claesson hit the post. However, ill-discipline cost the visitor. Darren Dietz took the first penalty of the game, and Avangard’s second power play brought the opening goal from Nikolai Prokhorkin. Back at equal strength, the Hawks quickly doubled the lead when Boucher won a puck battle on the boards and set up Igor Martynov for a one-timer. That assist moves Boucher to 62 (35+27) points for the season, overtaking the club record set by Roman Cervenka in 2011. Boucher had a great chance to add to his record with a penalty shot in the 18th minute, but he lost control on his approach to Ivan Fedotov’s net and the opportunity went begging. Barely a minute later, though, the home team had its third goal thanks to Nikita Kholodilin.
Shaken by its first-period problems, CSKA came out for the second looking to salvage the game. For long spells, Avangard was penned into its own zone. The visitor had four times the attacking possession, and outshot its host 14-5. However, Khomchenko performed heroics to keep the opposition out. That include denying Mikhail Grigorenko’s penalty shot after Ivan Nikolishin was penalized for kicking a broken stick towards a CSKA player. Within a minute, though, the Muscovites had a goal: Konstantin Okulov fed Sergei Plotnikov at the back door and he smashed in a one-timer.
The third period followed a similar pattern to the second. CSKA had almost all the play, Khomchenko had all the answers. Avangard spent just 58 seconds on the attack and managed just two shots on goal. However, one of them, from Tomas Jurco, went into an empty net in the final second to complete a sixth straight win for the Hawks.
Goalies on top in Chelyabinsk
Traktor Chelyabinsk 0 Severstal Cherepovets 1 SO (0-0, 0-0, 0-0, 0-0, 0-1)
Like Avangard, Severstal recorded a sixth successive victory today. Unlike the Hawks, the Steelmen had a hard time solving opposing goalie Zach Fucale and the game remained scoreless through 65 minutes.
Traktor handed a debut to forward Jack Rodewald, recently signed from Kunlun Red Star. He went into the third line. Severstal, despite its current winning streak, also made several changes to its bottom six line-up.
Neither team committed too much forward in the first period, with the two trading 15 shots on goal and 10 more blocked. Traktor arguably had a slight edge, but neither team came all that close to scoring.
In the second period, the penalty count began to build, but neither team could generate much on its power play. Severstal started to enjoy more of the game, but it was becoming clear that Fucale and his opposite number Alexander Samoilov were the key figures in this game.
Not much changed in the third. However, at the start of overtime, Severstal was close to winning it with a shot against the post. In response, Traktor moved forward and had a couple of dangerous attacks but still could not score.
It took an extended shoot-out to finally see the puck in the net. Yegor Stepanov and Nikita Soshnikov converted the first two attempts, then Nikita Korostelyov and Maxim Shabanov also scored to move the series into sudden death. Each of the four successful shooters went again, but only Stepanov repeated his goal to give Severstal the verdict.
Motormen overcome Admiral's defense
Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg 4 Admiral Vladivostok 2 (0-1, 2-0, 2-1)
The Motormen followed up Monday’s win over CSKA by defeating basement club Admiral. Back-to-back home victories tightened Avtomobilist’s grip on a top-four position in the East. Now Nikolai Zavarukhin’s team is three points clear of Lada, and level with third-placed Salavat Yulaev.
In the early stages, the Sailors tried to block up center ice as much as possible, keeping Avto to the outside. The tactic worked. In the opening 15 minutes, the home team forced just one save out of Vasily Demchenko. At the other end, Admiral also struggled to create much but a power play chance saw Nikita Anokhovsky put away the rebound from Alexander Gorshkov’s shot.
For a long time, the home team could not convert its control of the puck into serious chances. In the end, though, individual skill unpicked the visiting defense. Anatoly Golyshev’s vision produced a fantastic defense-splitting pass, taking three opponents out of the game to present Alexei Makeyev with the tying goal. That inspired more effort from the host and further chances came thanks to individual skills. However, the go-ahead goal was a shorthanded effort. Danil Romantsev intercepted the puck and set off on the rush alongside Makeyev before finishing the play himself. Admiral had a great chance to tie it up again right away when Nikita Tryamkin followed Golyshev into the box to give Admiral a minute of five-on-three hockey. Leonids Tambijevs called a time-out to dictate the play but Avtomobilist held on, blocking three shots in 24 seconds to preserve its lead.
The visitor managed to draw level at the start of the third through Dmitry Buchelnikov. However, the home team would not be denied. Sergei Zborovsky quickly restored Avtomobilist’s lead and Sergei Shirokov’s empty-net tally sealed the win.
SKA shoots down Amur
SKA St. Petersburg 6 Amur Khabarovsk 2 (2-0, 2-1, 2-1)
Surprised by Severstal in its previous game, SKA had little trouble with Amur after returning home to St. Petersburg. Two early goals set the tone as Roman Rotenberg’s team moved back into third place ahead of Spartak.
The Tigers actually made quite a promising start to the game, testing Nikita Serebryakov a couple of times in the early exchanges. However, captain Alexander Nikishin put SKA in front in the fourth minute. Two minutes later Pavel Dedunov doubled the lead when he converted the rebound from a Sergei Tolchinsky effort. Amur responded by removing starting goalie Igor Bobkov and sending Dmitry Lozebnikov into the game.
After that, Amur managed to keep the score at 2-0 until the end of the first period. The visitor even grabbed a goal back at the start of the second thanks to Vladislav Barulin. However, SKA always posed an offensive threat and Stepan Starkov quickly restored the two-goal advantage. In general, the second period was more evenly fought but late in the session SKA added a fourth. Starkov was in the box at the time, but Alex Broadhurst presented Artyom Zemchyonok with the puck and he quickly despatched it beyond Lozebnikov.
At the start of the third, Amur pulled a goal back through Yefim Gurkin. There was a further boost for the Tigers when SKA unsuccessfully challenged the play and found itself killing a delay of game penalty. However, the power play offered little and Marat Khairullin put the game out of reach when he scored in the 53rd minute. Sergei Sapego added a sixth, and Borna Rendulic rang the iron late on.
Red Star’s revenge
Dinamo Minsk 2 Kunlun Red Star 5 (2-1, 0-1, 0-3)
Kunlun got quick revenge for Tuesday’s 1-5 loss in Minsk, defeating Dinamo just 24 hours later. The Dragons had to come from behind in this game, but did enough to earn a third victory of the season against the Belarusians.
The home team looked to be in control after two goals in a minute midway through the first period. Dmitry Deryabin opened the scoring on the power play, than Daniil Sotishvili’s dangle doubled the lead. Sotishvili also scored in yesterday’s game and three of his six goals this season have come against Red Star.
However, the passage of this game was disrupted by a monumental clean hit on Andrei Stas. Turner Ottenbreit stopped the Minsk captain dead in his tracks right in front of the Red Star bench. Stas wasn’t happy, sought to remonstrate and got into a fight with his Kunlun counterpart Brandon Yip. When the dust settled, Yip took 2+5+10+game, while Stas was cited a 5+20. The Dragons killed the penalty, and grabbed a goal late in the frame when Spencer Foo scored on a breakaway.
Late in the second period, Devin Brosseau tied the game at 2-2, and the third saw a quickfire double from the Foo brothers put the visitor in control. The two were active all night, and just 36 seconds separated their markers. Parker Foo scored first, putting Red Star up for the first time in the game. Then Spencer claimed his second of the night to give the visitor some breathing space. Brosseau joined Spencer on two goals with an empty-netter to seal the win.
