KHL Medvescak Zagreb have won their first game at the NESCAFE Salata Winter Classic“, beating HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana 3:1. In the course of the night, ore snow has fallen, but the game on Sunday should go ahead as planned. If you got hold of one of the 4.500 tickets, prepare extra time, warm socks and a decent amount of thirst. Captain Alan Letang gets all romatic at the thought of playing outdoors again on Sunday: I hope to play underneath the starlight, starlight” , he grins, but then returns to business. “We’ll have to play simple. Get the puck to net and use the rebounds. Knowing the rink will be of advantage, I ‘m sure. As is our discipline. In that weather last night, nobody wanted to sit in the cooling box.” Slava Trukhno and Joel Prpic were out on Friday and will likely be so on Sunday.
EC-KAC have returned to winning ways on Friday, and Chris Brandner wants to use the momentum: “We need wins to get home ice advantage in the next stage. We need to stop leaking goals whilst shorthanded. We worked on that a lot. But for now, we’re all looking forward to play in an open air game, especially one so well-organized by Medvescak Zagreb. They have a lot of experienced players and it will be an extremely tough game, but were within a shout I think. An early goal would help a lot.”
Tyler Scofield could be back, while Tyler Spurgeon and Stefan Geier will need some more time.

Red Bulls travel far
SAPA Fehervar AV19 host EC Red Bull Salzburg, so let’s hope Marty Turco brought some exciting new card games for the time on the bus. The Devils, however, have lately beaten Sunday’s opponents by a large margin in Salzburg. “The result of our previous encounter doesn't show the real playing strength of the Red Bulls. It cannot cross our minds for a single moment that it will be an easy game for us. Our last game will probably further motivate our opponent and they will pose an even bigger challenge. Their newly signed goalie, Marty Turco is the latest star addition to the EBEL and he will help immensely their quick and aggressive hockey. The basis of our play must be our defense again which has been functioning well in the previous time period. Our special play hasn't been great lately but this could be crucial again tomorrow. It will not be easy to meet the expectations of our fans but our goal is keeping the points at home - said their assistant coach, Lajos Enekes:
Sapa Fehérvár AV19's coaching staff is planning no major line-up shake-ups but there will be no decision about the starting goalie until game day.
EC Red Bull Salzburg will be without Danny Bois, Rob Davison and Jeremy Williams. Doug Lynch, who’s tied with Linz’ Curtis Murphy for top-scorer amongst Defenders with 15 goals, is fired up and knows about the importance of the game: “Every game is the most important game for us now. We want to gain home ice advantage, and to achieve that we need wins. Szekesfehervar have a lot of fans and great building. They have a lot of energy when playing at home and are surely one of the hardest team to beat on the road.”

Olimpija host Linz
HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana (third on the Powerplay) are at home to EHC Liwest Black Wings Linz (second on the man-advantage). The Dragons suffered defeat in Linz just a few days ago and Hannu Järvenpää expects another tough game. We have respect for their team. We need to play better than last time and we need to do the small things right. The last home games boost our confidence. We want to show our home strengths. Everyone looks to the table at the moment and everyone knows how close it is. We need a win to improve our situation in terms of the fight for home advantage.” Igor Cvetek, Ales Music and Anze Ropret are out, while Sergei Smirnov and J. P. Lamoureux are expected to return the Line-up.
Linz (without Philipp Lukas, Pat Leahy and Martin Grabher-Meier, Daniel Oberkofler returning) have headoach who really deons’t like defeats. Or in the word’s of the man himself, Rob Daum: „better now than in the playoffs. We have a few players out but that doesn’t mean we can sit back and let other teams defeat us. We need to find a way to win with a different line-up. We need to play a solid defensive game and be more productive in front of the net. We’ll have to be careful all the time, but especially when John Hughes is on the ice. He’s the heart of their game and he’s the topscorer of the league for a reason. If we want to get something out of the match, we’ll have to bring our a-game.”

Sunday, 05. February 2012, 18:30;
Live-TV: HRT CRO live + Live-jumps: ServusTV.
KHL Medvescak Zagreb – EC-KAC (252)
Referees: DREMELJ, TRILAR, Piragic, Widmann.
Previous matches:
09.10.2011: KHL Medvescak Zagreb – EC-KAC 0:5 strafbeglaubigt
01.11.2011: EC-KAC – KHL Medvescak Zagreb 4:6 (1:0, 0:3, 3:3)
02.12.2011: EC-KAC – KHL Medvescak Zagreb 1:5 (1:2, 0:2, 0:1)
13.01.2012: KHL Medvescak Zagreb – EC-KAC 3:1 (1:0, 0:1, 2:0)
24.01.2012: EC-KAC – KHL Medvescak Zagreb 4:5 (3:2, 0:2, 1:1)

17:30 SAPA Fehervar AV19 – EC Red Bull Salzburg (251)
Live-TV: Sportklub (HUN)
Referees: JELINEK, SMETANA, Nagy, Smeibidlo
Previous matches:
16.09.2011: EC Red Bull Salzburg – SAPA Fehervar AV19 5:2 (2:2, 2:0, 1:0)
21.10.2011: SAPA Fehervar AV19 – EC Red Bull Salzburg 3:2 n. V. (0:0, 1:0, 1:2, 1:0)25.11.2011: EC Red Bull Salzburg – SAPA Fehervar AV19 3:2 (0:0, 1:1, 2:1)
30.12.2011: SAPA Fehervar AV19 – EC Red Bull Salzburg 1:4 (0:1, 1:1, 0:2)
24.01.2012: EC Red Bull Salzburg – SAPA Fehervar AV19 1:7 (0:1, 0:2, 1:4)

17:30 HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana – EHC Liwest Black Wings Linz (253)
Referees: BOGEN, VEIT, Ettlmayr, Mathis.
Previous matches:
18.09.2011: EHC Liwest Black Wings Linz - HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana 4:2
(2:1, 2:1, 0:0)
25.10.2011: HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana – EHC Liwest Black Wings Linz 2:3
(0:1, 1:1, 1:1)
25.11.2011: EHC Liwest Black Wings Linz – HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana 4:0
(0:0, 3:0, 1:0)
30.12.2011: HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana – EHC Liwest Black Wings Linz 2:1 n. P. (0:1, 1:0, 0:0, 0:0, 1:0)
24.01.2012: EHC Liwest Black Wings Linz – HDD TILIA Olimpija Ljubljana 4:0
(1:0, 1:0, 2:0)