Spartak revives hopes, SKA faces elimination. March 21 playoffs
Spartak found its scoring form after suffering two shut-outs. Today’s victory over Metallurg brings that series back to life. Today’s other action saw Avtomobilist push SKA to the brink of defeat: an overtime goal from Curtis Valk in Yekaterinburg puts the Motormen up 3-0 in the series.
Motormen pile the pressure onto SKA
Avtomobilist Yekaterinburg 2 SKA St. Petersburg 1 OT (0-0, 1-0, 0-1, 1-0)
Avtomobilist leads the series 3-0
After winning twice in St. Petersburg, Avtomobilist kept up its hot form on home ice in Yekaterinburg. A hard-fought battle needed 17 minutes of overtime to separate the teams, but Curtis Valk’s goal puts the Motormen one victory away from the last four. SKA is on the brink of falling in the second round for the first time since 2014.
After losing the first two games of the series, SKA’s head coach Roman Rotenberg made changes. Brendan Leipsic returned, taking the place of Alex Galchenyuk, while Alexander Kadeikin was also scratched. The “Omsk” partnership between ex-Avangard men Sergei Tolchinsky and Arseny Gritsyuk was restored as Rotenberg refreshed every line except the first. On defense, Mikhail Pashnin was back after injury while Maxim Fedotov reappeared after sitting out game two. Avtomobilist, meanwhile, saw no need to change a winning team.
In the early exchanges, both teams largely bypassed center ice. Initially, Avtomobilist was the more effective team. Home advantage inspired the Motormen, with Alexei Byvaltsev’s line creating more than one testing moment for Nikita Serebryakov in the SKA net. The visitor responded on the counter, and also looked menacing when it had the game’s first power play.
As the first period progressed, SKA upped the physical ante and battled its way into better attacking positions. With Avto forced to focus more on defense, the home team showed its mettle in puck battles and interceptions as the opening frame finished goalless.
After the intermission, Avtomobilist continued to press and forced chances on the turnover. Alexei Makeyev got clean through, only for Serebryakov to come off his line and snuff out the danger. When the home team was forced to defend, it produced a compact, disciplined back five to hold SKA to the outside.
In the circumstances, it was no surprise that the opening goal came from a counterattack. Artyom Zemchyonok’s pass was cut out by Anatoly Golyshev and he set off for an odd-man rush with Danil Romantsev. Golyshev finished it off himself to claim his fifth goal of the playoffs.
For much of the season, SKA has played three-line hockey in the third period, especially if chasing the game. Today, Rotenberg stepped away from that tactic and continued to use his full complement of players. The game continued in a similar vein, but a couple of big moments midway through the session shaped the outcome. First, Serebryakov made a huge save to deny Brooks Macek at the back door. Had it gone to 2-0 at that stage, it was hard to see a way back for SKA. The next minute, though, the game was tied. Gritsyuk raced down the left and after Evgeny Alikin stopped his first shot, the SKA forward followed up to convert the rebound.
The remainder of regulation brought something of a lull in hostilities, with both teams seemingly happy to regroup and take their chances in overtime. However, in the final moments SKA almost stole the win: Pavel Dedunov and Emil Galimov both tested Alikin late on, but the home goalie kept them at bay.
The extras began with a couple of great chances for Avto. Macek failed with another one-on-one chance, then Stepan Khripunov misfired from a threatening position. Subsequently the initiative frequently changed hands and both goalies had work to do. However, with the next intermission coming into view, Fedotov made a mess of his attempted clearance and Curtis Valk claimed possession. He exchanged passes with Macek before finding the open corner to win the game.
Spartak gets off the mark
Spartak Moscow 5 Metallurg Magnitogorsk 2 (2-0, 0-1, 3-1)
Metallurg leads the series 2-1
Spartak brought this series back to life with a gutsy win in Moscow. The home team blew a 2-0 lead, but produced a couple of quick goals in the third period to secure the win. After losing both games in Magnitogorsk, this was a vital success in game three.
Spartak failed to score in the first two games of the series, but wasted little time in putting that right once back on home ice. The home team created several early chances before Maxim Tsyplakov’s fifth-minute effort opened the scoring. Andrei Loktionov had an assist, bringing play into the visitor’s zone before dishing off the puck for Tsyplakov to beat Ilya Nabokov at last.
That fast start set the tone for a strong first-period display from the Muscovites. Spartak led the way in shots (19-9), hits (11-4) and attacking possession (5:30 vs 3:48). And late in the frame that effort got its reward when Alexander Pashin’s attempted Michigan caused confusion in the Metallurg defense. The second wave of Spartak offense saw Ivan Morozov fire the puck back to the slot and, in the confusion, Valery Orekhov deflected it into his own net.
Magnitka responded with a goal right at the start of the second period. It was a moment that home goalie Dmitry Nikolayev will want to forget: he skated out of his goal, but didn’t see Denis Zernov streaking down the ice to steal the puck away from him. Zernov took it around the back and eventually stuffed it into the net despite the attentions of the Red-and-White defense. It took just 15 seconds of the middle frame for Metallurg to get itself back into the game.
After that, the visitor took control. Those key stats were largely reversed and if Metallurg could not make big inroads into Spartak’s advantage in shots on target, that was mostly due to the 15 blocked shots that the home defense delivered. There was some relief for the Muscovites when Luke Johnson took the game’s first penalty in the 35th minute, but the balance of play was firmly tilted in the visitor’s favor.
The third period brought another quick Metallurg goal. Artyom Minulin banged the puck in from the point and it flew out of the corner back to his fellow defenseman Makar Khabarov. He stepped in from the blue line to fire past the disoriented Nikolayev and tie the game.
This time, though, Spartak found a response – and a big one. Instead of allowing more Metallurg pressure, the home team got right back on the attack and two goals in five minutes steered the outcome back towards Alexei Zhamnov’s men. Nikolai Goldobin restored the lead in the 47th minute, picking up the pieces behind the net to score after his first attempt to set up a shot from the slot was beaten away. Then Pavel Poryadin redirected a Dmitry Vishnevsky point shot to make it 4-2 with eight minutes to play.
Metallurg’s hopes of completing a second recovery took an instant blow when Zernov was assessed a slashing minor. Spartak did not generate much with the power play, but ate up two valuable minutes of game time keeping Magnitka at arm’s length.
The coup-de-grace came in the 58th minute after Nabokov went to the bench. Metallurg’s six skaters lost possession and Goldobin put his second of the night into an empty net to wrap up a convincing – and morale-boosting – win for Spartak.
