Loko too strong for SKA, Leivo sinks ex-colleagues. October 18 round-up

Lokomotiv won 3-1 at SKA, leaving the Petersburg club out of the playoff spots in the West. Josh Leivo scored the winner for Traktor against his former club Salavat Yulaev, and Ak Bars made it seven straight wins with a shoot-out success at Barys.

Leivo shoots down former team-mates

Traktor Chelyabinsk 2 Salavat Yulaev Ufa 1 (0-0, 0-0, 2-1)

A late goal from Josh Leivo against his former club saw Traktor to a narrow victory on home ice. The Canadian, who set a KHL goal record last term, scored his seventh of the season in the 58th minute to settle Saturday’s game.



Traktor welcomed back defenseman Sergei Telegin after an injury. He took Dominik Mikanovich’s place. The visitor handed a KHL debut to Nikolai Khvorov and brought Evgeny Sorokin into the team in place of Alexander Khokhlachyov and Ilya Fedotov.

The game started with a good opportunity for Maxim Kuznetsov to put the visitor in front, and the early stages went pretty well for Ufa. However, in a game short of big incidents, the balance of play veered towards Traktor as the intermission approached. Leivo was close to grabbing the opening goal, but would have to wait.

The middle stanza followed in similar style and the game remained goalless through 40 minutes.

At the start of the third, Anton Berlyov suffered an injury and the visiting forward had to be stretchered from the ice. Leivo continued to threaten, missing another good chance before Yegor Korshkov opened the scoring after 44 minutes. Jordan Gross fired in the shot, and Korshkov was first to the rebound.

That lead was short lived. A couple of minutes later a defensive breakdown invited a counter-attack that ended with former Traktor D-man Evgeny Kulik banging a rebound past Chris Driedger.

But it was another “ex” who grabbed the winning goal on the power play. Grigory Panin was in the box when Leivo found the net from the circle to shoot down his former club.
 

Seventh heaven for Ak Bars

Barys Astana 2 Ak Bars Kazan 3 SO (1-2, 0-0, 1-0, 0-0, 0-1)

Ak Bars moved to second in the Eastern Conference after securing a seventh successive win. But the trip to Kazakhstan proved testing, with the game going to a shoot-out after the visitor blew a 2-0 lead.



The action got off to a slow start with most of the opening five minutes spent battling for possession on the boards. Kirill Savitsky was the first to change the script, generating a chance with an explosive one-on-one break and helping Barys gain the first offensive foothold of the game.

However, the home team could not convert that into a goal and Alexander Barabanov’s fine feed set up Grigory Denisenko for the opener on the counterattack. Worse was to follow for Barys when Mikhail Fisenko added a shorthanded goal in the 16th minute, scoring at the second attempt after he initially hit the post. Barys was unable to respond in the remainder of the power play, but got a goal back on 16:25 when Vsevolod Logvin conjured a scoring chance.

Ak Bars had a goal whistled off at the start of the second period for offside. The puck stayed out of the net for the rest of the frame, but at the start of the third Kirill Panyukov tied the game at 2-2.

Subsequently there was little to choose between the teams, although Barys arguably carried a slight advantage. However, neither side could force a winner in regulation, nor in overtime. Barys swapped goalies, sending Adam Scheel out in place of Andrei Shutov. But the American could not secure the win; Barabanov beat him to claim the only successful attempt of the series.  

Loko adds to pressure in Petersburg

SKA St. Petersburg 1 Lokomotiv Yaroslavl 3 (0-2, 0-1, 1-0)

The unconvincing start to the season continued to SKA, beaten at home by Western Conference leader Lokomotiv and still outside the playoff spots. Bob Hartley’s team goes three points clear at the top of the West, but trails overall leader Metallurg by two points after today’s win.



With just one victory in seven attempts, SKA needed to produce a performance today. Head coach Igor Larionov swapped his starting goalies, with Yegor

Zavragin taking over from Artemy Pleshkov. Young forward Nikita Nedopyokin replaced Igor Larionov Jr to make his fourth appearance of the season.
Meanwhile, Loko was looking to build on a 4-1 home success against CSKA after a sticky spell of just one win in four. That victory came at home to today’s opponent.

The Railwaymen adopted a high press from the start and had the better of the opening exchanges. Thus it was no surprise when the opening goal went to Alexander Radulov in the 13th minute. After a long spell of pressure on Yegor Zavragin’s net, Rushan Rafikov’s was blocked by Danila Galenyuk only for Radulov to put away the rebound. Just before the intermission, a similar passage of play saw Rafikov fire home a second goal, putting Loko in control at the end of the first period.

SKA was held to just three shots at Daniil Isayev in the opening stanza. In the second period, the home offense had more of a say, testing the visiting goalie 13 times. The best of those attempts came from Vladislav Romanov in the 29th minute when he twice drew big saves from the netminder. However, Lokomotiv continued to have more of the game and shortly after that scare it extended its lead on a goal from Artur Kayumov. He steered Alexander Yelesin’s feed into the net to make it 3-0.

That left the home team with work to do in the third, and a power play goal from Sergei Plotnikov in the 45th minute offered hope of a fightback. A slick combination involving Marat Khairullin and Mikhail Vorobyov set up Plotnikov for a goal on one of his former clubs.

But that was as close as SKA got. Isayev produced a highlight-reel save to deny Brennan Menell when the defenseman seemed certain to score, then in the last minute the goalie stopped Andrei Loktionov’s penalty shot to secure a 3-1 verdict.