SKA - Torpedo - 1:2. Game Two

28 February 2015

SKA played their second match of the KHL Gagarin Cup first round series against HC Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod today inside the Saint Petersburg Ice Palace. Head coach Vyacheslav Bykov opted to make no changes to the line-up after taking game one 6:3 yesterday, with Mikko Koskinen still being backed up by Ilya Ezhov.

Unlike yesterday there was no fast and furious start, as our players struggled to get set up in Torpedo’s zone during the opening minutes. Indeed it was Torpedo who began to create the best chances in front of goal, and following a few dangerous moments they broke through. A huge goalmouth scramble erupted, and Yevgeni Mozer managed to stuff it over the line. That gave the visitors confidence, and they made it two as Artyom Blazhievsky wristed hard under Mikko Koskinen from between the circles. That finally got our team going, and before the period was out they got on the board. Roman Rukavishnikov bullied his way on to the crease, and with a little help from the left hand post he scored. It could have even been a tied game immediately, but Viktor Tikhonov failed to put away Ilya Kovalchuk’s beauty of a feed.

Not an awful lot happened during the second stanza, as Torpedo calmly controlled the game in both zones not giving SKA a lot to gain hope from. Blocker side Mikko Koskinen had a few shots to deal with, and on the powerplay a huge slapper called Mikko into sharp action crouched down. As time went on SKA did pressure a lot more though, and a couple of Torpedo penalties helped our players put the heat on. Viktor Tikhonov went close from the left faceoff circle, and Jimmie Ericsson couldn’t force the puck in when on the crease.

It was much the same story in the third, as chances really were few and far between. Torpedo relied on pacy breakaways, while SKA did try to get set up in the opponent’s zone with little success. Andrey Kuteikin had one of the best opportunities, as his powerful wrister was trapped by a combination of the netminder’s blocker and stick. Despite a late timeout and Mikko Koskinen getting pulled our team couldn’t force the issue enough, and drop game two 1:2 making it 1:1 in the series overall.

Match protocol:

SKA – Torpedo – 1:2 (1:2, 0:0, 0:0)

Goals:

0:1 Mozer (Dmitriy Kazionov), 07.16

0:2 Blazhievsky (Malevich, Stolyarov), 09.29

1:2 Rukavishnikov (Ketov), 12.22

Goalkeepers: Koskinen – Kasutin

Shots: 30 – 22

Penalty minutes: 6 – 14

Faceoffs: 33 – 20

Blocked shots: 7 – 11

Hits: 26 – 29