SKA – Spartak

SKA – Spartak – 4:2

24 December 2022

In a thrilling battle, SKA outlasted Spartak Moscow at the Ice Palace in the 2022/2023 KHL regular season, claiming a tense 4:2 triumph in the concluding home match of the calendar year.

A holding penalty taken by Marat Khusnutdinov with Spartak on a 2-on-1 counter-attack opened the door for the visitors to strike immediately with only 37 seconds on the clock.

Having escaped his marker to the right of the slot, Shane Prince made no mistake after being expertly picked out.

Spartak wasted a glorious opportunity to tally their second on a subsequent powerplay. On the slot, Daniel Usmanov seemingly had an empty right corner to aim at, but he contrived to poke wide.

SKA made Spartak pay for that miss with an equaliser on the powerplay in the 13^th minute. Unmarked on the doorstep, Dmitrj Jaskin tapped the puck past Spartak goaltender Patrik Rybar when connecting with a trademark pass from Nikita Gusev.

The visitors had an ideal chance to retake the lead in the last knockings of the first period. After exiting the penalty box, Philip Varone found himself completely clean through, but he could only backhand against Dmitry Nikolaev’s extended left pad.

Spartak did grab their second advantage of the afternoon in the sixth minute of the second stanza.

With SKA once again caught horribly out of position in defence, Prince was all alone on the left flank, and he calmly slid the puck in with the backhand after receiving an accurate feed from the opposite wing.

The hosts tallied their second equalising goal midway through the period when shorthanded. Initially, Marat Khairullin’s pass towards an onrushing teammate was intercepted, but he collected the bouncing puck and nudged it between Rybar’s pads.

SKA spent the vast majority of the stanza firmly on the front foot. Competing at an intense tempo, our players created several promising opportunities, with Damir Zhafyarov, Alexander Volkov and Valentin Zykov coming particularly close from decent positions.

At the start of the third period, Nikolaev pulled off an important stop, shutting the door on young Spartak defenseman Yegor Savikov who had looked certain to score.

Our team finally took their maiden advantage of proceedings in the 48^th minute.

Khairullin was the hero, as he gave a flowing play the finish it deserved from the right faceoff circle.

Moments later, Marat Khusnutdinov thought that he had scored another powerplay for SKA from the right, however his marker was disallowed as a consequence of offside. Spartak used their coach’s challenge straight after the puck had gone in.

Predictably, Spartak forced the issue as the minutes ticked by. However, SKA calmly kept the feisty visitors at arm’s length, and Jaskin ended the game as a contest with only 51 seconds remaining as he bundled the puck in from the slot. Rybar was back in Spartak’s net for that goal after the away team had lost the decisive faceoff draw.

It’s worth pointing out that thanks to his markers in this game, Jaskin now boasts 100 KHL goals in just 167 appearances, a league record!

SKA will now prepare to face CSKA in Moscow on Wednesday. Puck-drop is scheduled for 19:30 local time.

Match protocol:

SKA – Spartak – 4:2 (1:1, 1:1, 2:0)

Goals:

0:1 Prince (Zaseda, Khokhlachyov), 00.37 PPG

1:1 Jaskin (Gusev, Nikishin), 12.51 PPG

1:2 Prince (Khokhlachyov, Kvartalnov), 25.14

2:2 Khairullin (Nikishin), 30.01 SHG

3:2 Khairullin (Zhafyarov, Gusev), 47.18 PPG

4:2 Jaskin (Komarov), 59.09

Goalkeepers: Nikolaev – Rybar