Rauma and Tampere move on

KalPa Kuopio vs Lukko Rauma 1-2, series 2-4

The first period was quite open, but it was Lukko getting the first goal of the night through a nice lift over goalie Andy Chiodo by Janne Lahti, who benefited from a perfect pass through the whole KalPa defense from Olli Sipiläinen. In the second period both defensive lines dominated and so the next goals only came in the third when Henrik Forsberg doubled the score for Lukko with a tip in of a puck that Ville Nieminen got in front of the goal with everything he had fighting his way past the KalPa defenders. From here on it was a huge fight for KalPa, but all they got on the scoresheet was a rebound of Jaakko Rissanen, that ended up in the net.

Helsinki IFK vs Tappara Tampere 3-4 OT, series 2-4

The game started as many others in the series before: With a first goal by Joonas Rask for HIFK. What followed was also known from older games of the series. HIFK could not hold on to that lead. Olli Palola played it until the last second, picked up a loose puck in the slot and sent the game with a 1-1 tie into the locker rooms. In the second period the game should get wild when Antti Erkinjuntti and Pekka Saravo found themselves in Tappara’s penalty box. HIFK used both resulting powerplay situations to score 2 goals by Lauri Taipalus and Juuso Puustinen within 22 seconds. Tappara came back only minutes later by scoring twice themselves within 23 seconds. First Elmeri Kaksonen finished off a quick combination of the Tappara offense and then Pekka Jormakka converted a turnover in the neutral zone.

No goals were added in the last official period and so the visitors in Helsingin Jäähalli had to wait until 14:23 minutes had passed in overtime to see the decisive moment. Aleksi Elorinne skated around HIFK goalie Kevin Lankinen and tried a wraparound but his miss ended up on Erkinjuntti’s stick, who put it in the net to send Tappara to the Semifinals.

On Friday the Semifinals will start with these matchups:

Kärpät Oulu vs JYP Jyväskylä
Tappara Tampere vs Lukko Rauma

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