With the Frölunda Indians already qualified out of Group A of the Champions Hockey League, it’s a straight shootout between ZSC Lions Zurich and the Vienna Capitals for the second spot, and with two games between the two sides coming up to try and decide who advances, the first game in the Hallenstadion in Zurich was crucial to get the advantage ahead of next week’s rematch.

The hosts got off to a flyer with less than 90 seconds played, as Zurich looked set to go on an early powerplay, they moved the puck around the offensive zone before a pinpoint pass across the ice from Phil Baltisberger found the tape of Denis Hollenstein who fired a wicked one-timer past Jean-Philippe Lamoureux for the opening goal of the game; and then just over 10 minutes later with the team officially on a powerplay, they added a second through Jérôme Bachofner who tipped Drew Shore’s blast from the point past Lamoureux to make it a 2–0 advantage to the hosts going into the second period.

With just over five minutes played in the middle frame, ZSC extended their lead, this time Marco Miranda picked up the puck behind the goal line before making a nifty move in front of net and managing to get the shot off despite losing his balance, seeing his shot hit the back of the net for his first ever CHL goal.

Vienna fought back through the second period and were finally rewarded late on as Alex Wall saw his shot ricochet around before finally finding it’s way to the back of the net to get the Capitals onto the scoresheet on the powerplay, but the lead was re-opened to three goals just over a minute later as the puck ended up coming off the body of Kevin Klein and redirecting past Lamoureux for a 4–1 lead for Zurich, with the veteran of 627 NHL games not knowing too much about it.

Vienna put Matthias Tschrepitsch in net for the final period, and it didn’t take long for the change to spark the Capitals into life as Peter Schneider roofed his backhanded effort to make it a two-goal deficit with plenty of time remaining.

After killing a penalty, Vienna continued marching on and it paid off again with just under 15 minutes to play, this time the goal scorer turned provider as Schneider fed Rafael Rotter out in front to make it a 4–3 game, before a wild finish saw the teams rack up a further four goals! With three of them going to the home side, it was advantage Zurich with a 7-4 win as the two sides battle for a spot in the Round of 16 when they meet in Vienna next week.