Frisk Asker put up a solid fight against a Tappara Tampere team that has won 10 Liiga games in a row, but ultimately the Finnish frontrunners did what they had to do to take three points on the road and keep pace with the leaders in Group F.

It was the home side that got the game’s first power play but Tappara opened the scoring shorthanded, with Otto Rauhala skating in alone and beating Fayen Vestavik with a backhander over the glove. Asker did even the score before the end of the period, however. With 46 seconds on the clock, Hampus Gustafsson’s long wrister eluded Christian Heljanko.

Things got a bit rough in the second period as the Norwegians tried to wear down Tappara, and it seemed to work for a while. With just under five minutes to go in the middle frame, however, Christian Bertrand finally restored Tappara’s lead, converting a cross-ice pass from Patrik Virta with a one-timer.

Asker weren’t done yet, though, as they had a couple of chances on the power play early in the third to tie the score. After killing them both off, Tappara finally got a bit of breathing room with exactly seven minutes left when Teemu Suhonen’s shot from the point hit Virta’s skate and went in. After a video review, the goal was allowed, which rounded out the scoring.