Kazakhstan ride Power Play to Victory

2015.04.20. 11:58 |

Kazakhstan showed they are a stronger team today but nothing is lost yet, Hungary control their own destiny in the fight for promotion to the A Pool.

Team Hungary's head coach Rich Chernomaz went with Bence Bálizs between the pipes with Miklós Rajna serving as the backup, the rest of the lineup stayed the same.

The first two minutes of the game didn't go well as Attila Orbán and Bence Bálizs picked up two quick penalties. Kazakhstan was peppering the goal throughout the 5 on 3. Konstantin Rudenko gave the Kazakhs the early lead when he jumped on a close rebound that he deposited in the back of the net.

Around the middle of the period Kazakhstan had the chance to go up 2-0 when the loose puck was pushed across the goal line. However, the play was whistled dead before the puck crossed the line. With the bullet dodged Hungary pulled themselves together but the former Soviet Republic was visible stronger and controlled the first twenty minutes.

Like in the first period Hungary struggled to keep up with the Kazakhstan pace, in situations like this teams tend to take more penalties. In the opening minutes of the second period Hungary had killed a penalty, seconds later Alexei Vorontsov took feed as he crashed the net and put the puck past Bálizs to put the Kazakhs up 2-0.

The rest of the second period was not much better as the penalties kept on stacking up for Hungary, this of course gave the Kazakhs scoring chances.

Kevin Dallmann made it 3-0 when he parked himself on the back post, took a pass and put it past Bálizs, the fourth Kazakh goal was very similar as the goal scorer was on the backside of the play and was a fraction faster than Bálizs.

It was clear that the two teams are not exactly on the same level Kazakhstan was bigger and stronger frorm start to finish. Ex NHL forward Konstantin Pushkaryov beat Bálizs for the fifth goal on a nice wraparound.

Hungary pulled the game out with no major injuries, on the plus side they have a day off to rest, also István Sofron will be back from his suspension and will be in the lineup on Wednesday against Italy.

Todays lineup:

Kóger, Sarauer, Banham
Sebők, Erdély, Hári J.
Kovács, Vas J., Vincze
Benk, Nagy K., Magosi B.

Orbán, Vas M.
Metcalfe, Szirányi B.
Gőz, Kiss D.
Pozsgai

Bálizs (Rajna)

Coaches' Corner

Rich Chernomaz: ”We defended well, but we didn't distribute the puck very well, we kept on throwing the puck back up the wall into pressure instead of away from it, concencuntly we were not really able to create offseason. They played a very sound game, they blocked shots, had sticks in passing lanes and deflected a lot of shots, most of our shots came from the premeriter, they are a very good skating team and played very disciplined, we did create very much offensively.”

Andrei Nazarov: ”It was a good game, we scored first, its important to score first especially at the start of the first period. We scored four in the first two periods and the game was over, now we concentrate on the next game.”

View from the Ice

Frank Banham: ”We didn't have the start that we wanted by giving them a 5 on 3, we gave them the momentum right off the bat. we came back hard and pushed back but i thought the first period was good for us, but they were too good to come back against. we got away from our game plan today and they play at a higher level than we are used to.”

Andrew Sarauer: ”We knew going in that they would be a good team, we fell behind and it was tough to get back into it. We got away from our game plan by getting pucks in and establishing a forecheck. We did not create enough opportunities and didn't put enough pucks on net. We got to drop this one and focus on the next one.

Bence Bálizs: “I feel I made some mistakes, two of the goals were my fault, we played a man down for a large part of the game. For some reason we were not able to get past them. If we pay attention and not commit penalties I think it would have been a lot closer game.”

The Hungarian Squad

Goalies (2): BÁLIZS Bence (Miskolci Jegesmedvék) RAJNA Miklós (Fehérvár AV19)

Defensmen (7): KISS Dániel (Újpest) ORBÁN Attila, SZIRÁNYI Bence (Fehérvár AV19) POZSGAI Tamás (Dab.Docler), GŐZ Balázs, METCALFE Tyler (Miskolci Jegesmedvék), VAS Márton (Löwen Frankfurt, DEL2)

Forwards (13): BANHAM Frank, BENK András, EREDÉLY Csanád, KOVÁCS Csaba, KÓGER Dániel, MAGOSI Bálint, SARAUER Andrew, VINCZE Péter, (Fehérvár AV19) NAGY Krisztián (Miskolci Jegesmedvék) SEBŐK Balázs (Hokki, FIN2) SOFRON István (Krefeld Pinguine, GER), VAS János (Slavia Praha, CZE) HÁRI János (MODO, SWE)

Coaching Staff

Head Coach: Rich Chernomaz
Assistant Coaches: Gergely Majoross, Tamás Sille, Diego Scandella
Goalie Coach: Gary Clark

World Championships Schedule

Sunday April 19

Hungary-Japan 4-2

Kazakhstan-Ukraine 5-2

Italy-Poland 2-1

Monday April 20

Kazakhstan-Hungary 5-0

Italty-Ukraine 2-1 OT

Poland-Japan 2-0

Tuesday April 21-Off day