Among the eight teams that were competing in the Erste Bank Junior League playoffs three of them came from Hungary as Vasas, Fehérvár AV19 and MAC Budapest were all in the final eight.
Klagenfurt-Vasas 2-0
The red white and blue club snuck into the playoffs as the seven seed despite losing their regular season game, they faced the number two KAC. László Székely-Mádia gave Kristóf Bozsó the start in net on the road. Vasas scored first on a Viktor Török, after a scoreless second period Vasas doubled their lead on a powerplay goal when Armand Szlepka found the back of the net. However in a six minute span KAC was able to flip the score with two powerplay goals and tacked on an empty net goal at the end.
In the second game in Budapest was a tight game as well, Bozsó got the start again, after a scoreless first period Török opened the scoring against as Vasas took 1-0 lead but this didn’t last long as minutes later KAC tied it up, in the third Vasas took back the lead but Klagenfurt scored twice in a ten second span and that was enough to knock out Vasas from the playoffs
MAC Budapest-HK Celje 2-1
The Budapest squad traveled south to Slovenia to take on Celje in what became a high scoring first game. Balázs Kangyal gave Boldizsár Györ the start in game one, in the opening period MAC had a two goal lead as Barna Jászai scored twice. Celje out scored MAC 3-2 in the second period with Péter Kőrösi and Gergely Tóth scoring the two goal, but MAC still held a one goal lead. Things fell apart in the third, in the opening minutes MAC made it 5-3 when Pavle Podunavac scored, but the Slovenians scored four unanswered to take the 7-5 win in game one.
In Budapest things went a bit easier for the Hungarian team, as Kristóf Dobos got the start in net. After a scoreless first period, in the second period Dávid Sebestyén and Péter Lakatos both scored power play goals to sandwich a Celje goal, in the third period things opened up as MAC ran off five goals as Kőrösi and Sebestyén both doubled in the game with Jászai, Bruno Kreisz and Ákos Szigeti scoring the other three in what became a 7-2 win.
The rubber match in the series was back in Slovenia and like in game one this proved to be a high scoring event. Dobos started in goal for the second game in a row, Antonio Sarcia scored the lone of the first period but MAC blew up in the second period as they scored seven goals. Tamás Vajda, Hunor Lakatos and Miklós Gyurgyev all scored in a three minute span, Gyurgyev would score for a second time as well in the period with Tóth and Jászai also scoring. The third period was all Celje but they were not able to come back into the game as MAC ended up winning 8-5 and advanced to the semi finals.
LA Stars-Fehérvár AV19 2-1
Fehérvár finished the regular season on the top of the standings and in game one of the playoffs they played a tight game against the LA Stars, coach István Kóger gave Gerley Bors the start in net. Olivér Kovács gave Fehérvár the 1-0 lead on a power play goal in the first period, Dávid Szabó scored the only goal in the second period as Volán took a 2-0 lead into the third period. The Stars scored in the first minute of the third and tied it up minutes later, but a Donát Szita power play goal ended up being the difference maker in a 3-2 win.
In game two in Austria Bors was the keeper of choice as Kóger stuck with the hot hand, 17 seconds into the game Volán was up 1-0 on a Patrik Imre goal, Patrik Kiss made it 2-0 after the first twenty minutes. In the second period the Stars came back to tie it up at 2-2 and the teams headed into the third period all tied up. the third period was all LA as Volán was not able to keep up, the Stars scored three goals to set the final at 5-3.
In game three Alba Volán hopped to win the series on home ice, they jumped out to a 3-0 lead after the first on goals by Szita, Zoltán Erdei and Renátó Tóth. In the second twenty minutes the Stars scored five times whereas only Kovács scored for the Hungarian side who found themselves down 5-4 on home ice. In the last twenty minutes fehérvár was not able to ties the game up and in the end the Stars scored an empty netter to win 6-4 and knock the top seed Fehérvárout of the playoffs.
Semifinals Schedule
Saturday March 14th
KAC-MAC
RedBull-LA Stars
Wednesday March 18th
MAC-KAC
LA Stars-RedBull
Saturday March 21st (if needed)
KAC-MAC
RedBull-LA Stars