Dinamo draw level

In another closely fought defensive battle, Dinamo Moscow, the champions of the West, were 2:1 victors against Omsk in the second game of the Gargarin Cup Final. With this victory, the series heads back to Moscow level, with Dinamo now holding the cards with home ice advantage. Dinamo only managed to get 16 shots on goal in the game, and head coach Oleg Znarok once again stressed defensive hockey, especially after they took the lead early on in the opening period.

The first period opened at a furious pace, and whilst Avangard were dominating puck possession and creating the better of the chances, it was Dinamo who would get on the board first. Alexander Yeryomenko had to make three great saves in quick succession, and soon after Dinamo managed to break on the counter, and Denis Kokarev left Anton Belov behind with a brilliant deke, before scoring on his backhand. In the final minute of the period, Avangard's Alexander Nesterov went to the box for a two minute holding the stick penalty, and after just six seconds on the man advantage, Dinamo had doubled their lead. The Moscow side won the faceoff, and an Ilya Gorokhov point shot was stopped by Karri Rämö, but Leonid Komarov, who was crashing the net, managed to get a piece of the puck and knock it into the net as he fell to the ice whilst under pressure by Anton Belov. Dinamo had outshot Avangard 8-4 in the first period, and held a 2:0 lead going into the break.

Chances were hard to come by for both teams in the second period, as the teams styles cancelled each other out. Rämö was called into action, making a great glove save on a Dominik Graňák point shot, before Yegor Averin hit the post at the other end of the ice. Dinamo had a powerplay in the last few minutes of the second period, and despite a great effort by Mikhail Anisin, the period would be goalless, and the score remained 2:1.

It took less than a minute of the third period for Avangard to finally break their duck. Poor play by the Dinamo defence gave Avangard a 3 on 2 break, which Alexander Perezhogin duly finished with a wrist shot over the shoulder of Yeryomenko. It was Perezhogin's second goal of the Final, and with nearly all the period left to play, set up a great final period. The home side outshot their opponents 17-3 in the final frame, as they laid siege to the Dinamo net. Sergei Kalinin, Igor Volkov and Alexander Frolov were denied in quick succession by Yeryomenko, who really stole the show in the third period. With 24 seconds left to play, Dmitri Vishnevskiy took a tripping penalty, giving Avangard a 6 on 4 powerplay, but they simply couldn't find a way to beat Yeryomenko, and Dinamo managed to hold on for the hugely important Game 2 victory.

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