- Lausanne ranked 2nd overall with three wins and one overtime loss
- Storhamar have a single win in OT
- FIRST TIME FACE-OFF BETWEEN THESE TWO TEAMS
Lausanne HC have had a phenomenal start to their Regular Season in the Champions Hockey League, collecting wins against Pinguins Bremerhaven, Ilves Tampere and most recently, Fehérvár AV19. Their sole stutter-step was a 2-1 loss in OT to Czech Extraliga Champions Oceláři Třinec on Game Day 1.
Defensively the Swiss side have performed strongly, allowing just six goals over their four games to date. The backbone of that has been the performance of netminders Kevin Pasche and Antoine Keller who collectively are averaging just over a goal per game. Offensively, Lausanne are averaging a healthy 2.5 goals per game, putting them in the top quartile for productivity. Up front, Ken Jäger has amassed 5 points (3G, 2A), and he's in good company with teammates Antti Suomela, Damien Riat and Michael Raffl who are all currently averaging a point per game.
Ranking 20th in the Regular Season standings, Storhamar have faced some incredibly tough opponents, suffering defeat at the hands of ZSC Lions Zurich, Genève-Servette and most recently the Växjö Lakers. Luckily, the hard work of the Norwegians paid some dividends on Game Day 3 against Fribourg-Gottéron, where they picked up their first SO win of the 2024/25 season.
What's hampered Storhamar so far? The differential between their capacity to generate offence, and limit goals against. Currently, this team is giving up three goals per game, while their goal generation lags behind at 1.5 goals per game. If this side are to have any chance against the Swiss, they'll need to find open lanes and pull the trigger every chance they get.
Looking at special teams, Lausanne are statistically ahead on both powerplay effectiveness (17.65% compared to Storhamar's 15.38%) and penalty kill efficiency (100% compared to 91.67%). Curbing penalties will no doubt be another area of improvement for the Nordic side who clocked 33 penalty minutes during their last game against Swedish side Växjö.
Will Lausanne continue their upward trajectory and secure bragging rights, or will Storhamar drop the hammer of the gods?