The first two teams to qualify for the Champions Hockey League Quarter-Finals are both from Finland, as Lukko Rauma and Karpat Oulu both won on home ice. Skelleftea AIK became the third were soon joined by TPS Turku, who won in Storhamar.
Storhamar Hamar 1–2 TPS Turku
GAME HIGHLIGHTS | TPS WIN ON AGGREGATE 6–4
It was a magical ride while it lasted, but the clock has struck midnight for Storhamar Hamar, who came up just short against TPS Turku. Leading by a goal on aggregate, TPS increased it to 2 on an early power play. The never-say-die Dragons got it back courtesy Jason Bergland midway through the game, and then they pressed for the series equalizer. In the last minute, they pulled the goalie for a sixth attacker, but Henrik Tallinder scored for TPS to win the game and wrap up a quarter-final berth.
“I am proud of our guys, we fought very hard, but in the end TPS deserved to go through to the quarter-finals,” said Storhamar assistant coach Pal Johnsen. “Jacob Berglund scored a very beautiful goal, and if the opponent gives him a bit of time and space he can make magic happen.”
Storhamar goalie Oskar Ostlund thought, “We played a solid defensive game, and our defenders helped me alot with blocking shots and helping me, so that I was able to track the shots. Too bad we only scored 1 goal – that makes it hard to win, even though it still was close. This is the end of an epic adventure, and we now can focus fully on our league games!”
Skelleftea AIK 2–1 Eisbaren Berlin
GAME HIGHLIGHTS | SKELLEFTEA WIN ON AGGREGATE 7–3
Coming home with a 3-goal advantage, there was little in the way of drama as Skelleftea hosted Eisbaren Berlin. The Polar Bears got an early goal from Marcel Noebels to put a small dent in the deficit, but Martin Lundberg replied less than three minutes later and Erik Forsell scored on the power play with 3:24 remaining to make sure that Skelleftea won the hockey game as well.
“Of course it’s a relief that we are through to the next stage, we have the ambition to win this tournament. Tonight's game was far from our best performance but I’m proud of my team anyways – they come from a week-long break and we’ve had eight boys on different national team camps,” said Skelleftea coach Hans Wallson. “Eisbaren Berlin were a good opponent, they have a skilled team that will punish you if you let your guard down. And that was exactly what we did in the early stage of this game, but we were lucky to have a excellent Marcus Svensson in the net and at that point he saved us.”
Karpat Oulu 4–1 Sparta Prague
GAME HIGHLIGHTS | KARPAT WIN ON AGGREGATE 6–5
They entered the game down 2 goals on aggregate, but Karpat Oulu were confident on their home ice and, after a scoreless first period, dominated the second and scored twice to tie the total score. The two teams traded goals early in the third, then things settled down and it looked like overtime was looming, but Mika Pyorala decided the series with 49 seconds to play with a beautiful move, beating the Sparta defence to the outside and then sliding it through the pads of Tomas Popperle to put Karpat through to the quarter-finals.
“We cannot be satisfied. We had two goals more than Karpat. The first period we played well, but in the second period we played really passively and nobody moved. They got those two goals to tie it. Then in the third we scored but . . . the last goal was very unfortunate and it was the decisive goal. We are not satisfied,” said a clearly frustrated Sparta coach Josef Jandac, whose team has now been eliminated on a last-minute goal in the eighth-finals the last two seasons.
“It’s a tough spot to start two goals behind but we remained confident. We got to play the deciding game home and we played a good game. We didn’t score on our chances in the first but we believed in ourselves. We managed to respond to that 2–1 goal right away. Pyorala’s deciding goal was really sweet,” said Karpat coach Lauri Marjamaki. On the intensity he said, “It’s not usual to play games like these in the middle of the season. If these games don’t grow the team, I don’t know what will. The squad showed good mental fortitude and it feels great to continue to the elite eight of Europe.”
Lukko Rauma 2–1 Djurgarden Stockholm
GAME HIGHLIGHTS | LUKKO WIN ON AGGREGATE 4–2
Lukko Rauma became the first team to qualify for the CHL quarter-finals, and for them it's a return trip. They were in the driver's seat with a 1-goal lead on home ice, and increased it to 2 in the second period when Aaron Gagnon scored on a penalty shot. Mikael Ahlen got that one back for Djurgarden less than two minutes later, but they couldn't get another and Toni Koivisto's short-handed empty-netter with 1:19 to play sealed it.
“First of all congratulations to Lukko,” Djurgarden assistant coach Stefan Nyman began. “I think that, as I said earlier, once again this was a tight game between us and Lukko. I think it has been good two games for us and they could have gone either way. Today we should had scored on the power play opportunities we had. That would had led us to the next round.”
“I agree (with Nyman) that 5-on-5 the game was very similar to in Stockholm a week ago. Not a lot of chances at either end,” Lukko coach Juha Vuori replied. “We didn’t have as many special-teams opportunities as in the last game, obviously, since the third period there was so penalty-filled. Today we were able to play an okay penalty-killing game again and we were a little bit luckier on 5-on-5 chances.”