SKA - HC Sochi

SKA - HC Sochi - 1:2

12 October 2015

SKA played their second home match in a row today against Southern outfit HC Sochi. The team needed to regroup following the recent defeat against Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, and Andrei Nazarov made a few changes. Evgeny Artyukhin returned to the side replacing Joakim Lindstrom, and Andrei Kuteikin took his place in the fourth line. Mikko Koskinen was our netminder, with Andrei Gavrilov his opposite number.

The match begun at a high tempo, and SKA came out with all guns blazing wanting to finally take a home win. The puck was in Sochi’s zone almost all of the time, and after six minutes the first goal arrived. Ilya Kovalchuk outpaced his marker on the right, squared for Jarno Koskiranta on the doorstep, and the Finn poked past the goaltender. That gave the Ice Palace some life, and shots were being rained down on Sochi’s net from all angles. The best chance fell to Evgeny Artyukhin, but twisting at close range he couldn’t beat Andrei Gavrilov’s left pad. Sochi were causing more and more danger when counterattacking though, and they found an equalising goal against the run of play. Evgeny Skachkov wristed from distance, collected his own rebound, and backhanded under Mikko Koskinen’s glove. That goal deflated SKA somewhat, and Sochi grew in confidence firing in a number of dangerous attempts around our crease.

Maxim Chudinov slapped inches wide of the left post as SKA begun the second stanza on the powerplay, but the momentum quickly swung to Sochi. Not long after that chance Maxim was chucked out of the game with a 5+20 penalty, and the visitors had five long minutes to do what they like with the puck. Thankfully for us Mikko Koskinen was rock solid, and our penalty killers barely gave Sochi any goalscoring chances at all. Having killed that extended penalty our players built up some speed inside Sochi’s zone, and Jarno Koskiranta made the goaltender work with a backhander pulling to the right. With the frame drawing to a close Sochi were the next to take a game misconduct, as Denis Kazionov was removed from proceedings for a dirty hit against Dmitry Yudin.

Sochi took another penalty as the pressure increased, but despite having a two man advantage for a full two minutes SKA failed to carve Sochi open. Vadim Shipachyov was the only player to come close when alone next to the right post, however at equal strength Evgeny Dadonov was seriously close to giving SKA a second lead. Bursting clean through Evgeny floored the goaltender, but couldn’t find the open left corner. After that the game turned completely, and now it was Sochi drawing penalty after penalty from SKA. Our players weren’t going to get away with it either, as on a two man advantage Renat Mamashev wristed clinically over Mikko Koskinen’s blocker. Despite having a six on four our team couldn’t get anything going, and HC Sochi saw the game out comfortably. The next fixture will be against HC Spartak Moscow away in the Russian capital on Wednesday.

Match protocol:

SKA – HC Sochi – 1:2 (1:1, 0:0, 0:1)

Goals:

1:0 Koskiranta (Barabanov, Kovalchuk), 06.23

1:1 Skachkov (Semyonov), 17.28

1:2 Mamashev (Semyonov), 52.51

Goalkeepers: Koskinen – Gavrilov

Shots on target: 27 – 37

Penalty minutes: 37 – 37

Faceoffs: 25 – 34

Hits: 16 – 7

Referees: Belov, Rogachyov