Ak Bars wins Tatar derby, Barys edges past Ufa. November 21 round-up

Friday’s KHL action brought two games in the Eastern Conference. Ak Bars went to Neftekhimik and won 3-2 in the Tatarstan derby, and Barys went to seventh in the standings thanks to a 2-1 verdict at home to Salavat Yulaev. 

Kazakhs claim third straight win

Barys Astana 2 Salavat Yulaev Ufa 1 (1-1, 1-0, 0-0)

Goals from Alikhan Asetov and Jake Massie earned Barys victory over Salavat Yulaev. It’s a third straight success for the Kazakhs, lifting Mikhail Kravets’ team to seventh in the Eastern Conference. The visitor suffered a third successive defeat and remains outside of the top eight.

The game started brightly and there were plenty of good opportunities in the first period. Home defenseman Tamirlan Gaitamirov had the first big chance to open the scoring, but he was denied by the piping.

Midway through the session, Barys’s starting goalie Adam Scheel had a problem with his equipment. While he was getting that fixed on the sidelines, Andrei Shutov came into the game – and allowed the opening goal when young forward Artur Faizov found the net.

However, the home team recovered. Scheel returned to the game and soon after that Massie got to the back door and beat Semyon Vyazovoi to tie the game.

After the intermission, the teams played more cautious hockey. But, steadily, Barys got on top. Mason Morelli, who assisted on the opening goal with a fine feed, was close to scoring for himself. Alexander Komarov’s challenge saved Ufa on that occasion, but it was a short-lived reprieve when Asetov finished on the next attack.

Barys tried to keep up its momentum in the third period, feeling that offense was the best form of defense. There was a further boost for the host midway through the final frame when Vladislav Yefremov was assessed a double minor for high sticks, eating into the time available for a fightback. Asetov could have made the closing stages more comfortable had he converted after getting clean through on Vyazovoi, but Salavat could not punish that miss.

Kazan up to second

Neftekhimik Nizhnekamsk 2 Ak Bars Kazan 3 (0-1, 1-0, 1-2)

Ak Bars climbed to second in the Eastern Conference thanks to victory in the Tatarstan derby at Neftekhimik. Kirill Semyonov and Alexander Barabanov had two-point games to pace a tight verdict against the fifth-placed Wolves.

The visitor made itself at home in the first period, comfortably outshooting Neftekhimik and getting the only goal of the opening frame. It went to Barabanov in the 12th minute when he fired home Semyonov’s pass from the end boards.

After the intermission, Neftekhimik had more to offer. The home team got on the power play for the second time in the game – Grigory Denisenko the offender on both occasions – and Evgeny Mityakin tied the game. The home forward took up position on the slot in anticipation of a shot from Andrei Belozyorov and got his reward when he tipped a flying puck past Timur Bilyalov to tie the scores.

The teams remained deadlocked until deep into the third period. Then Denisenko atoned for his earlier penalties by restoring the Ak Bars lead in the 54th minute. After Mikhail Fisenko won an attacking face-off, Vladimir Alistrov drew the attentions of two forwards, creating space to dish off the puck to his team-mate for an accurate shot to the top shelf.

Neftekhimik had little time to save the game, and Ak Bars worked hard to ensure that there were few opportunities for the home team to establish possession in front of Bilyalov’s net. In the 59th minute, the Wolves finally managed to replace goalie Yaroslav Ozolin with a sixth skater, but that merely led to Semyonov finding the empty net. It wasn’t quite the final word, though: German Tochilkin struck with 36 seconds on the clock to keep the game alive to the finish.