Eisbaren Berlin defeated Lulea Hockey 4-2 and will once again play in the Round of 32, while the 2015 CHL winners will not advance. Read more in Gamecentre. 

Eisbaren Berlin are on to the Round of 32 after taking the maximum six points from Lulea Hockey, following a 4-2 victory in northern Sweden. It was a game where they knew that all they needed was a single point, but they did better than that and took all three.

Knowing they needed a win in regulation time, Lulea came quick out of the gate and got some early chances, but their efforts were derailed when Eisbaren struck against the flow of play on a quick on a counter-attack – Jonas Muller with a stretch pass to Julian Talbot who skated in alone on Joel Lassinantti and made no mistake, beating him top corner. Lulea seemed to back off after that and Berlin carried the play for the rest of the first period, but it stayed 1-0.

The game continued to saunter on up to the midpoint of the second period, with Lulea strangely not showing any sign of urgency, but then in the last half of the period Berlin broke it open with three goals. First Jens Baxmann caused a turnover along the boards, fed Talbot, and his cross-ice pass to Sven Ziegler was one-timed past Lassinantti. Three minutes later on the power play, Darin Oliver sent a high wrister into the the top corner on the power play. Then on another power play two minutes later it was Jamie McQueen on a rebound. Amazingly, it was 4-0 Eisbaren after 40 minutes, and it was no fluke – they had carried the play and had a 23-11 edge in shots.

"After they scored the first goal, we eventually just collapsed mentally and it felt like every single decision we made turned out wrong. So it feels quite disappointing right now that it didn't work out there today," said Lulea coach Stefan Nilsson.

After two listless periods, Lulea turned it on in the third and dominated, with the play in the Berlin end most of the last 20 minutes. After a few near misses, Anton Hedman finally got them on the board at 46:35 on a rebound. Then less than two minutes later it was 4-2, with the momentum of the game clearly turned around. They continued to press after that, but Berlin played solid zone defence with some big blocks and some timely saves by Petri Vehanen – who only faced 19 shots in the game but was solid when needed.

With the teams playing 4-on-4 with 9:04 to play, Nilsson made the bold move of pulling Lassinantti for an extra attacker. It nearly paid off and they hit a goalpost, but didn't get another goal, and an empty-netter from Daniel Fischbuch finished it.

"We're obviously happy with the win," nodded Berlin coach Uwe Krupp. "We knew it would be a difficult game. It was an important game for Lulea and we did a good job in the first few minutes when they were strong, but we stuck to our game and scored a few goals, which really helps your game when you play with the lead."

Speaking about how the game changed in the third period, he said, "Lulea needed some goals, so we knew they were going to come with a big push, but we defended well. Our goalie, Petri Vehanen played well all game, especially at the start, and the whole team played well defensively."

Nilsson said, "Two seasons ago, we did the 'impossible', coming back from five goals down in Salzburg, so we talked about that a little and tried to keep the spirit going and not give up. In the end, unfortunately, we weren't good enough today."

On not advancing to the playoff stage, he said, "We focus hard on the Champions Hockey League in the whole club, so obviously it's a disappointment not even making it to the playoffs. But we'll have to take this as a lesson and get even more ready for upcoming challenges."