A couple of Finnish clubs, IFK Helsinki and SaiPa Lappeenranta, won on home ice and are in good shape to secure second-round berths. In Group E action, Ocelari Trinec won in Stavanger and SC Bern beat Tappara Tampere in a shootout. Finally, Kosice edged Liberec for its first win.
HC Kosice 4–3 Bili Tygri Liberec
Peter Bartos's goal with 11:25 left in the third period broke a 3-3 tie and brought HC Kosice its first three points in the CHL before an appreciative home crowd.
"Thank God for the win, it finally came!" said a euphoric Adam Lapansky, who contributed greatly to the win with two goals. "We wanted to be mindful of making the individual mistakes we made in previous games, where we played mostly good but lost by slight margins. Today we managed to come from behind and beat Liberec, which makes us very happy."
"The decisive moment from my point of view was after our goal to take a 3-2 lead, we should have held and built on this, but Kosice tied it a few seconds later," said Michal Bulir, who scored twice for Liberec to remain the Cramo Top scorer. "I would trade that for winning as a team. We need points, but I need to continue contributing offensively."
Stavanger Oilers 2–3 Ocelari Trinec
The Stavanger Oilers won in Trinec on Game Day 2 and stayed right with them until the end again, but ultimately Ocelari pulled out the three-point win and now lead Group E with nine points. Zbynek Irgl scored twice for Trinec while Dan Kissel and Jean-Michel Daoust each had two points for Stavanger.
"We played a very tough game today," said Trinec coach Jiri Kalous. "Stavanger plays very organized. We played the body well and did the little things like blocking shots, forcing turnovers, unselfish play to lead us to victory. Stavanger has an excellent power play and they showed it again with those two goals. But we did it and the guys fought to the end. I think we deserved to win today."
“I am actually quite disappointed," said Stavanger coach Petter Thoresen. "I’m disappointed that we didn’t do the things we agreed upon. We weren’t disciplined enough and tried to outplay the Czechs and we’re just not good enough to do that. When we won on Thursday (against Tappara) and in Trinec we were cynical, trying to exploit their weaknesses, but today we were trying to stickhandle our way through impossible situations. That’s not gonna work against teams of this calibre.”
SC Bern 4–3 Tappara Tampere (SO)
When Pascal Berger gave Bern a 3-0 lead with 11:02 to play, it looked like they had three points in the bag. However, Tappara Tampere stormed back with three goals in the last eight minutes - Teemu Aalto's goal came with 1:11 left with a sixth attacker on the ice. Berger eventually scored the shootout-winner to salvage two key points in the extremely compact Group E.
SaiPa Lappeenranta 5–2 ERC Ingolstadt
In a key Group H match-up, SaiPa Lappeenranta won 5-2 to avenge a 4-1 defeat on Game Day 2 and take over first place in the group. Cramo Top Scorer David Spinna added two goals to his total, while David McIntyre contributed a goal and an assist.
"This was the toughest game we've had so far," assessed SaiPa head coach Pekka Tirkkonen. "It was mentally and physically tough. It was an even game but I think we maybe did some of the small things a little bit better and, of course, we got those two goals in the first period. Then they came back with a very strong second period so it was very important that we had that two-goal lead."
"It was an even game for the first half but we made too many turnovers and gave them too many easy goals. When you play against a team as good as SaiPa, you pay for those right away," said Ingolstadt coach Larry Huras. "The difference in the game was their goalie (Jussi Markkanen) played very well. In the first 10 or 12 minutes we had a few good scoring chances and if we'd scored on one or two of those, it could have been a different game."
IFK Helsinki 10–1 SønderjyskE Vojens
IFK Helsinki scored four times in the first period, led 8-0 by the 36-minute mark, and cruised to a 10-1 victory over SonderjyskE Vojens, a team that took them to overtime on Game Day 1. Cramo Top Scorer Miko Partanen and Tomas Zaborsky scored twice each, while Zaborsky and Teemu Ramstedt each had three points.
“We had a great start for the game and our goalie made some great saves," explained IFK head coach Antti Törmänen. "We were very effective in the first period, but we weren't happy with the way we played. We improved our play in the second period and then the game was our's to take. Flattering numbers. We really wanted to win in front of the home crowd.”