The Stavanger Oilers dropped their second game against Red Bull Salzburg in a shootout to fall to 1-2 on the season. Fribourg-Gottéron scored two 36 seconds apart and Reto Berra stood tall in net for the Swiss, stopping all 31 Ilves Tampere shots he faced as his club claimed their second victory of the year.

Last time these two clubs met, Stavanger ended Fribourg’s win streak in the Group Stage, upsetting them 1-0 in a game where the Swiss had their shots. Henrik Holm played a perfect road game, denying all 28 Swiss chances, including 12 high danger opportunities. Stavanger, on the other hand, were barely generating any shots from in the slot. But it would only take one – a rebound opportunity for Ludvig Hoff – to take the match.

Now back on home ice, the Norwegians will have the crowd’s energy on their side. As for improvements, their lack of scoring is disturbing as they’ve only managed 1.67 goals per game, only the Belfast Giants and Slovan Bratislava are worse. Stavanger also rank 25th in powerplay conversion with 7.69%. These areas will need to be addressed if they hope to have any success versus a more-than-competent Swiss side.

Fribourg were in unfamiliar territory. Down by 1 in the closing minutes, the Swiss pressured their challengers but Holm didn’t give an inch. According to the stats, they had the better expected win rate (64%), better expected goals rate (4.56 to 3.30) and more high danger opportunities. But for all the statistics in the world, the team failed to solve the Norwegian netminder and were left with nothing to show after 60.

The Swiss seem refreshed, however, and after securing their own shutout bid, they’ll look to continue that success in Norway. A better result starts with good defence and Fribourg have the second best goals against per game with 1.00. For offence they have the fourth best powerplay and this will prove handy if they find themselves on the man-advantage against Stavanger’s 25th ranked penalty kill.