This is a match-up of two teams that are likely not satisfied with how their first two games went and desperately need to pick up points on Game Day 3.

Skellefteå AIK opened strong with a 4-0 shutout of Red Bull Salzburg but a late collapse against Dynamo Pardubice saw them lose 4-3, dropping them to 10th place in the Regular Season Standings. While that’s not so bad, this will be Skellefteå’s third home game already, meaning they’ll play their final three Regular Season games on the road.

The Rouen Dragons also played their first two games at home but dropped both of them – 5-3 to ERC Ingolstadt and 8-3 to the Lahti Pelicans. The Dragons reached the Round of 16 in two of their previous three CHL appearances but they’re one of five teams still on zero points – they’ll have to get off the schneid soon to get back into contention.

These are two of the more physical teams in the competition, with Skellefteå ranked third and Rouen fifth in hits per game. Young Skellefteå D-man Elias Solomonsson leads the CHL with five hits, while the Dragons are more physical by committee – four players with two hits each and 10 more with one.

The top scorers are Skellefteå’s Rickard Hugg and Rouen’s Francis Perron with three points each. In fact, the Dragons haven’t been bad at all offensively with six goals so far and a powerplay that’s been firing at 36.36 percent, which is second-best in the CHL.

However, defence has been their problem with a CHL-worst 13 goals against and second-worst 74 shots against. Slovenian goaltender Matija Pintarič, who has shone in previous CHL seasons, has done all he could to stop the bleeding, making 61 saves so far, ranking him third in that department, but it's in front of him where the goals are being dropped.