SKA - Dinamo Minsk

SKA - Dinamo Minsk - 4:6

1 March 2023

In a 10-goal thriller, SKA came up short in game one of the first round of the 2022/2023 KHL Gagarin Cup playoffs, losing 4:6 against Dinamo Minsk at the Ice Palace.

The vast majority of the first period was controlled by the Belarusian visitors.

SKA opened the scoring midway through the frame with their first realistic opportunity, as Dmitrij Jaskin completed a flowing passing play after Minsk had coughed up possession inside their own zone. However, that setback didn’t seem to affect Dinamo, and they got back on level terms in the 18^th minute as Nikita Pyshkaylo whipped a rising wrister over Dmitry Nikolaev’s glove.

On a late powerplay in the period, Dinamo wasted a glorious opportunity to tally their second, with Vitaly Pinchuk tipping the puck inches wide of the right post.

Having made an improved start to the second stanza, SKA grabbed the advantage again through Evgeny Ketov with the 37-year-old carefully lifting his wrist shot past Shostak glove-side after receiving a superb pass from Damir Zhafyarov.

That lead sadly didn’t last for long. On the powerplay, Cedric Paquette tallied Minsk’s second equaliser in somewhat fortunate circumstances, banking the puck over the line off the back of Nikolaev after the initial attempt from the blue line had taken a wicked deflection off the boards.

Both teams wasted glorious opportunities throughout the remainder of the period. Svyatoslav Grebenshchikov, Roman Gorbunov and Vladimir Alistrov all found themselves clean through, but not one of them could score.

Unfortunately for us, Minsk subsequently ran away with the match in the third period thanks to their sheer ruthlessness in front of goal.

Roman Gorbunov put the Belarusians ahead in the 47^th minute, aiming his strong wrist shot past the unsighted Nikolaev seconds after a powerplay had ended.

The killer blow was struck with a little over six minutes left in the stanza.

Powering away on the counter, Alistrov unleashed a seemingly harmless backhander from the right, but somehow Nikolaev allowed it to creep under his pads.

Vitaly Pinchuk appeared to ice the game with a late empty-netter. SKA weren’t prepared to wave the white flag without a fight, though, suddenly tallying two markers within a minute as Alexander Volkov hit the jackpot from the doorstep and Nikita Gusev beat Shostak from a tight angle.

SKA kept Nikolaev off for the extra skater for the remaining 19 seconds, but that only resulted in Alistrov registering another goal into the empty net.

The second game of the series will take place on Friday in Saint Petersburg. Puck-drop is scheduled for 19:30 local time.

Match protocol:

SKA – Dinamo Minsk – 4:6 (1:1, 1:1, 2:4)

Goals:

1:0 Jaskin (Gusev, Khusnutdinov), 11.09

1:1 Pyshkaylo, 17.21

2:1 Ketov (Zhafyarov), 23.11

2:2 Paquette (Barberio, Spooner), 25.04 PPG

2:3 Gorbunov (Sapego), 46.51

2:4 Alistrov (Merkley), 52.55

2:5 Pinchuk, 57.30 EN

3:5 Volkov (Vorobyov, Khairullin), 58.43