When the Redhawks visited Kuopio to begin this CHL season, they built up a 4-1 lead and then saw it evaporate, thanks to a hat-trick from Kai Kantola, and lost 6-4. Since then, they have two one-goal wins against Stavanger, while Kuopio lost twice to Kometa Brno, attaining one point in the process. Now, the Redhawks and KalPa meet again in Malmö and it’s a big game for both teams - with Kometa flying high at the top of the group, it’s likely one of these two teams will fail to advance.

“It’ll be a pretty tough game,” said KalPa forward Konsta Mäkinen. “We’ll just try to follow our game plan, skate a lot, put the puck on the net and play a great 60 minutes over there.”

“We were happy with the way we played the first two periods and we want to play like that again,” said Malmö forward Tuukka Mäntylä, referring to the first meeting between the teams. “In the last period, though, we have to play smarter. We gave them too many 2-on-1s and we shouldn’t do that, especially when leading.”