Both of these teams had their CHL seasons ended last season by eventual champions JYP Jyväskylä – Tappara Tampere in the Round of 16 and Kometa Brno in the Quarter-Finals. Now they will meet each other in this year’s Round of 16 to see who will go to the Quarters, and it promises to be a close battle with no clear favourite. For Kometa, that would equal their longest CHL run in their second try, while Tappara have never advanced past this point in four previous attempts.

Although these teams have never met each other in the CHL, they have met teams from the other’s leagues, with mixed results, so there shouldn’t be any big surprises as to the styles of play. In this year's Group Stage, Tappara took five of six points from Oceláři Třinec.

Both of these teams have been dominant in their domestic leagues in recent seasons, but are off to rather mediocre starts this year. After back-to-back Czech Extraliga titles, Kometa’s domestic season has been up and down so far. They had won three in a row before Sunday’s 2-1 loss in Mladá Boleslav, and are currently seventh in the 14-team league. Tappara, who have made the Finnish Liiga finals six years running, got off to a poor start before winning five in a row in October. They’re now 1-1-0-2 in their last four, beating HPK at home 2-1 on Saturday.