The ZSC Lions also win their second preliminary round game in the Champions Hockey League. Fribourg-Gottéron, on the other hand, loses for the first time.
The ZSC Lions beat the Finnish team Ilves Tampere 4:1, just as they had done two days earlier against Storhamar Hamar. Defenseman Patrick Geering (12th) and Rudolfs Balcers on the power play (26th) gave the visitors a 2-0 lead. Jesper Fröden missed the chance to make it 3-0 after exactly 31 minutes with a missed penalty, but it didn't matter in the end.
Although the Finns reduced the deficit to 1:2 (39') with a goal in overtime by Daniel Gazda, another Zurich defender, Dean Kukan, restored the two-goal advantage eight minutes later. As with the 2:0, the assists came from the new Finn Santtu Kinnunen and Denis Malgin. Vincent Rohrer was responsible for the final goal to make it 4:1 with another power play goal in the 57th minute.
ZSC has thus put itself in a good position to advance to the round of 16. The best 16 of the 24 teams reach these after six games each. Next week, the Lions will host the Straubing Tigers and Salzburg respectively.
In the duel between Storhamar Hamar and Fribourg-Gottéron, the 3088 spectators did not see any goals in regulation time or overtime. In the 26th minute, Fribourg's Marcus Sörensen missed a penalty for the more dangerous visitors. So the penalty shoot-out had to decide.
All four Fribourg players failed to score, while Samuel Solem and Jacob Berglund were successful for the hosts.
Gottéron, who won 4-3 at home against the Sheffield Steelers on Thursday, have two more away games coming up in mid-September, against Klagenfurt and Ocelari Trinec.
SDA
