New season begins July 31

The last day of July seems to be the start of the 2012-13 hockey season, at least in the Czech Republic.

Action from last year's European Trophy, featuring Sparta

Praha against Linkoping. Europeantrophy.com.

The last day of July sees the first game of the 2012 European Trophy, and it will be hosted by the Czech Extraliga's newest team, Piráti Chomutov, against Slovan Bratislava. Just as last year, seven Czech clubs will compete in the 32-team tournament, with Piráti taking the place of Slavia Praha. The other six are Sparta Praha, Bílí Tygři Liberec, Pardubice, České Budějovice, Plzeň 1929 and Kometa Brno.

What began as a pre-season tournament for Scandinavian clubs, the European Trophy has grown in size and stature over the past few years, to the extent where last season teams were refusing to relinquish players to their respective national teams so they could compete for the championship. This season, more of the tournament has been scheduled into the traditional international breaks, and it is assumed players will stick with their club teams then as well. In recent IIHF-led discussions about the future of club hockey in Europe, one of the speculated scenarios had the competition grow into a full-out international league.

The top eight teams will play in the Red Bull Salute, December 15 to 18 in Bratislava and Vienna. The full tournament schedule can be seen here. Last season, three Czech teams were among the final eight.

The last day of July also sees the first-ever exhibition game for the first Czech-based club to compete in the Kontinental Hockey League: Lev Praha. They kick off their 10-game pre-season schedule on Tuesday night at Svijanská Arena in Liberec against Rytíři Kladno at 17:30 CET. The Lions then take on host Bílí Tygři in a cat fight on Thursday night.

Jaroslav Svoboda shoots on Drew MacIntyre at Lev Praha's

first training camp. Photo: Vladimír Jína, levpraha.cz.

A similarly-named club based in Poprad, Slovakia competed in the KHL last season, and this edition of HC Lev has a few returnees, including captain Ľuboš Bartečko along with defenceman Jiří Hunkes and forwards Juraj Mikúš and Jiří Sekáč. Other notable names include goaltender Tomáš Pöpperle, defenceman Michal Sersen and forward Tomáš Rachůnek, who all played last season for Sparta, as well as ex-NHLers Tomáš Mojžíš, Marcel Hossa, Erik Christensen, Jiří Novotný, Michal Řepík and Jaroslav Svoboda.

The team's pre-season roster and schedule are available now at the Czech version of the club website; the English version should be online within a week.

Pardubice and Liberec hold on to win on road

Written for Eurohockey.com:

A pair of close, tight-checking games were played on Tuesday night in Czech Extraliga playoff action. Pardubice held off a late charge by Vítkovice to win 3-2 and even the series 2-2, while Liberec got a late empty-net goal to win 3-1 in České Budějovice and take a series lead of the same score.

Vítkovice 2 - 3 Pardubice
(Best-of-seven series tied 2-2)

Jan Starý opened the scoring at the 28-second mark.
Photo: Petr Kotala, hc-vitkovice.cz.

Pardubice evened the series thanks to offence provided by Jan Starý in the first 40 minutes and great goaltending by Martin Růžička in the final 20.

Starý scored a pair of goals for visiting Pardubice in the first half of the opening period to give his team a quick 2-0 lead. On the first shift of the game, a neutral-zone turnover led to the first goal. Eight minutes later, a seemingly harmless shot from the boards found its way into the net.

In the second period, though, Vítkovice got those two goals back. Just past the game's midpoint, Petr Pohl took a pass in the neutral zone, skated in on Růžička, and beat him with a backhander to make it 2-1. Then with 1:19 left i the middle frame, they tied it when a pinball shot from Lukáš Klimek went off the skate of Radovan Somík, the back of Růžička, and in.

The tie was short-lived, though. Just 25 seconds later, Starý got his third point of the evening, setting up Václav Kočí with the eventual winning goal.

It was all Vítkovice in the third period, but they could not beat Růžička. As the final horn went there was a flurry of action around the Pardubice net, but they kept it out to preserve the victory.


České Budějovice 1 - 3 Liberec
(Liberec leads best-of-seven series 3-1)

Fans who watched Tuesday night's game in České Budějovice saw a great goaltending duel between Mountfield's Jakub Kovář and Bílí Tygři's Tomáš Vošvrda. For nearly two periods, the duo was unbeatable. However, Liberec's top line lived up to its billing on this night, as the trio of Petr Nedvěd, Tomáš Urban and Milan Bartovič put on their workboots and provided all of the team's offence.

Before the goals came, Vošvrda was the busier of the two netminders, as his club was back on its heels for a long stretch when they took four penalties in a row. Late in the second period, Liberec started applying the pressure, and Kovář made a blocker save, but Nedvěd put in the rebound in traffic with 4:31 to go in the frame.

The two teams traded goals early in the third. Just 21 seconds in, Nedvěd's shot was deflected mid-air by Urban for the second goal that Kovář had virtually no chance on. Just over two minutes later, the home side got one back when Pavel Kašpařík scored on another deflection.

With five minutes to go, Kašpařík had Budějovice's best chance to tie it from in close, but couldn't beat Vošvrda. Finally, Nedvěd recorded his third point of the game with an empty-net goal to put it away.


Liberec will now be looking to put the series away on home ice on Friday, where they will be looking to advance to the semifinals. Pardubice will also play at home on that night, where they will play the critical swing game against Vítkovice.

Vítkovice and Budějovice even series on the road

Written for Eurohockey.com:

A pair of Czech Extraliga clubs faced the prospect of going home in their quarterfinal series down 2-0, but both rallied to win and even their respective series. Vítkovice won in a shootout in Pardubice, while České Budějovice scored five times in the third period to win in Liberec.

Pardubice 2 - 3 Vítkovice (shootout)
(Best-of-seven series tied 1-1)

Filip Šindelář was looking through traffic for much of Friday's game.

Photo:  Jan Jedlička, hcpce.cz.

The visitors from the Silesio-Moravian border city of Ostrava never led in game two of their quarterfinal series in Pardubice, but they got timely goaltending from Filip Šindelář, had an answer both times they were scored on during regulation and eventually prevailed in a shootout to win the hockey game.

Pardubice captain Petr Koukal opened the scoring on a first-period power play when he won a battle for the rebound. After Šindelář made a great save in the opening minute of the second to prevent his team from falling behind two goals, the reliable duo of Jiří Burger and Viktor Ujčík worked some magic to tie the score, which was finished off by Ujčík's bullet that beat Martin Růžička.

As the game's midpoint approached, Vítkovice got a chance to to take the lead when they got a chance on the power play, but just as they did in game one, they surrendered a shorthanded goal, as Šindelář was helpless to stop Tomáš Zohorna's one-timer on a two-on-one. They did get it back, though, in the last minute of the second period while the teams played four-on-four; Jan Káňa had an easy tap in after a miscue by Pardubice forward Jan Kolář (not to be confused by the defenceman on the same team with the same name; they are unrelated).

Pardubice got a pair of power-play chances in the first half of the third period and was dangerous on them, but Šindelář stood tall in goal, making key stops against both of Pardubice's Jan Kolářs to keep the game tied. In overtime, he denied Kolář the forward once more.

In the shootout, Šindelář stopped both Pardubice shots he faced, one of them a nice poke-check against the forward Kolář, who just couldn't buy a break in this game. At the other end, Burger and Ujčík scored on two of Vítkovice's two three attempts to end the game.

Liberec 4 - 6 České Budějovice
(Best-of-seven series tied 1-1)

Jakub Kovář made 42 saves to help his team win on Friday.
Photo: Vladimíř Jína, hcbilitygri.cz.

With exactly one minute left in the second period, Marek Tročinský streaked across the blueline, took a feed from Daniel Špaček, and and perfectly fired a high shot over the glove of Jakub Kovář, the Budějovice goaltender who had given them fits to that point in the game, to give Liberec a 2-1 lead.

With a lead after two periods against the sometimes offensively challenged Mountfield club, it looked like the White Tigers were in good shape to take a two-game lead in the series. Early in the third period, while shorthanded, Lukáš Vantuch scored his second goal of the game when he got his own rebound and scored to make it 3-1. The Liberec squad appeared to be on its way. But the game changed, and it changed quickly.

Just 35 seconds later, Mountfield managed to cash in on their power play, which was still in progress, Martin Podlešák tipped in František Ptaček's point shot. Then, 43 seconds after that, the visitors caught a bit of a break when Peter Mikúš threw the puck toward the Liberec net and it hit forward Pavel Kašpařík on the instep of his right skate and went in to tie the score. Less than three minutes later, Jakub Langhammer was in the right place at the right time to give the club from South Bohemia its first lead of the game.

The barrage of goals in the period was not over yet, though. Liberec did tie the score when Tomáš Urban took a pass from Vantuch and fired a shot just under the crossbar. It was the fifth goal of the period, which was not yet half over.

Mountfield retook the lead with 7:08 on the clock when, on a two-on-one, Tomáš Mertl found Rudolf Červený, who put a perfect shot inside the post past the glove of Marek Pinc. But the dangerous Liberec offence wasn't just going to give up, and when Budějovice took a too-many-men penalty with 5:54 to go, the game was nearly tied again.

Petr Nedvěd, the league's leading scorer through the regular season but held pointless in this game, got his best chance of the night on the late power play, but was robbed at point-blank range by Kovář, who also took care of Michal Bárta's attempt from further out right afterward. Almost lost in all the third period scoring was the goaltending of Kovář, who has been the difference in so many of his team's games this season and was the reason they were within striking distance after two periods. He stopped 42 of 46 shots on the night.

Jiří Šimánek's empty-netter, the seventh goal of the period, made the final score 6-4. It was Šimánek's second goal of the game, part of a three-point game.


Both series are now idle for two days while the other two quarterfinal series, Sparta Praha-Brno and Plzeň-Zlín, get underway. The third and fourth games in Vítkovice and České Budějovice will be played on Monday and Tuesday.

Quarterfinals begin Thursday

On Tuesday night, PSG Zlín defeated Oceláři Třinec 4-1 in the fifth and decisive game of their preliminary round series. In addition to dethroning the reigning champions of the Czech Republic, it also rounded out the field of the final eight teams and locked in the quarterfinal match-ups. Read Jon Rowson's recap of the game at Eurockey.com.

In addition to being a fellow Eurohockey writer, Rowson also blogs about Czech and Slovak hockey at Velvet Hockey, and he recently made predictions about the upcoming quarterfinal round. Rowson has picked all four higher seeds to advance, which is hard to argue with, though it hasn't been the norm in recent years.

Trying to pick the winners of Czech playoff series is often a guessing game, as upsets are common. Every year, there seems to be a club that comes out of nowhere to go deep into the playoffs. Last year, seventh-seeded Slavia Praha upset second-seeded Liberec in the quarters and then led first-place Třinec three games to one in the semifinals before ultimately succumbing. Třinec became the first team since 2002 to finish first during the regular season and then win the playoff tournament as well.

This year, though Sparta and Plzeň would seem to be favourites in their series, nothing is guaranteed, and the other two series are almost up in the air.

The quarterfinal match-ups are as follows:

(1) Sparta Praha vs (8) Kometa Brno
(2) Plzeň 1929 vs (7) Zlín
(3) Pardubice vs (6) Vítkovice
(4) Bílí Tygři Liberec vs (5) České Budějovice

Pardubice-Vítkovice and Liberec-České Budějovice play their first two games on Thursday and Friday, followed by the other two series on Saturday and Sunday. The above mentioned Rowson, Petr Polák and myself will combine to provide daily coverage of the action at Eurohockey.com.

From hokej.cz, here is the schedule of the quarterfinal games that we know will take place. All times are Central European and all games will be webcast at tv.hokej.cz.

Thursday, March 8 - 1st games:

18:10 HC ČSOB Pojišťovna Pardubice - HC Vítkovice Steel (Nova Sport)

18:30 Bílí Tygři Liberec - HC Mountfield České Budějovice

Friday, March 9 - 2nd games:

18:10 Bílí Tygři Liberec - HC Mountfield České Budějovice (ČT4)

18:30 HC ČSOB Pojišťovna Pardubice - HC Vítkovice Steel 

Saturday, March 10 - 1st games:

17:30 HC Sparta Praha - HC Kometa Brno (Nova Sport)
17:30 HC Plzeň 1929 - PSG Zlín

Sunday, March 11 - 2nd games:

17:00 HC Sparta Praha - HC Kometa Brno
18:10 HC Plzeň 1929 - PSG Zlín (ČT4)

Monday, March 12 - 3rd games:

17:30 HC Vítkovice Steel - HC ČSOB Pojišťovna Pardubice
18:10 HC Mountfield České Budějovice - Bílí Tygři Liberec (Nova Sport)

Tuesday, March 13 - 4th games:

17:30 HC Mountfield České Budějovice - Bílí Tygři Liberec

17:40 HC Vítkovice Steel - HC ČSOB Pojišťovna Pardubice (ČT4)

Wednesday, March 14 - 3rd games:

17:40 PSG Zlín - HC Plzeň 1929 (ČT4)

18:00 HC Kometa Brno - HC Sparta Praha

Thursday, March 15 - 4th games:

17:30 PSG Zlín - HC Plzeň 1929

18:10 HC Kometa Brno - HC Sparta Praha  (ČT4)

Extraliga Round 38

Petr Polák of Eurohockey.com is once again providing round-by-round recaps of the Czech Extraliga. In Round 38, the only home team to win was Liberec; led by four points from Petr Nedvěd, the White Tigers humiliated Kladno 8-2.

Liberec captain Petr Nedvěd (centre) regained the league scoring lead with with a goal and 3 assists against Kladno on Friday night. Photo: Joerg Stephan, pixilla.de, hcbilitygri.cz.

Zlín 2 – České Budějovice 3

The fans in Zlín had to wait for a goal until the 23rd minute. They were really happy when Ondřej Veselý gave them the lead, but their joy survived only 97 seconds. After Milan Gulaš equalized the score, Zlín would never lead again. Instead, Marek Melenovský was able to answer Gulaš’s second goal in the 44th minute, but České Budějovice scored the winning goal three minutes before the final horn.

Vítkovice 0 – Slavia Praha 6

The home team opened the game in style. Vítkovice had plenty of chances in the first period, including five power plays and one penalty shot, but didn't score. Slavia took it as an opportunity and scored a goal in the first minute of the second period. They then scored three more goals in the middle frame and two more in the third. The only shutout of the round goes to Dominik Furch, with 34 saves.

Karlovy Vary 1 – Oceláři Třinec 4

Defenceman Tomáš Klouček played his very first game for Třinec today after leaving the KHL's Lev Poprad and earned 1 goal and 1 assist. After 80 seconds of play, he opened the score, then ten minutes later he assisted on a goal by Martin Lojek to put his team up 2-0. Although Karlovy Vary got back in the game in the 17th minute, the Steelers of Třinec gained control of the match in the second period with two goals.

Kometa Brno 2 – Mladá Boleslav 1 (SO)

Brno earns two points in a shootout victory over Mladá Boleslav. This is probably a fair result because the game did not have much entertainment value. The visiting team opened the scoring in the 12th minute, and then Tomáš Svoboda tied the game at 1 in the 27th minute. After that, the fans at Kajot Aréna had to wait until the shootout before more goals were scored.

Pardubice 3 – Plzeň 1929 4 (SO)

This game was decided in a shootout as well. But in comparison with Brno-Mladá Boleslav, this was a more exciting game. Pardubice took the lead in the first period, but Plzeň equalized the score before the first period ended. The home team jumped in front again early in the second, but Plzeň tied it again. It was Plzeň that entered the last ten minutes of the third period with the lead, but Pardubice equalized the score as well. Jan Kovář was the man who scored the game-winner in the first shootout round, while nobody else was able to beat the goalies.

Litvínov 1 – Sparta Praha 6

Sparta entered the game in the position as the league’s leader, while 12th-place Litvínov trailed the Spartans by 30 points before it began. As was expected, Sparta won easily. The home team did not find the net until the 50th minute, and by that time, the score was already 5-0. The only thing the home fans had to get excited about was a fight between Litvínov's Ján Brejčák and Sparta's Angel Krstev; the home player won it and then pulled Krstev’s jersey over his head. Sparta's Petr Ton, who entered the game with a two-point lead on Nedvěd and Plzeň's Radek Duda in the scoring race, had an assist.

Bílí Tygři Liberec 8 – Rytíři Kladno 2

In terms of goals scored and margin of victory, Liberec is the king of the round. The second period was the most critical part of the game for Kladno, during which the Knights were scored on four times. Once they were down 6-0, Jiří Bicek and Marek Hovorka's goals barely made a dent. Liberec assured its victory with two more goals in the last five minutes.


Below are the league standings and scoring leaders, courtesy hokej.cz. For more detailed statistics, click here.

Standings:
Place	Club	GP	W	OW		OL	L	GF:GA	Pts
1	HC Sparta Praha	38	20	6		6	6	120:78	78
2	HC Plzeň 1929	38	20	6		5	7	130:98	77
3	HC Mountfield České Budějovice	37	20	3		2	12	106:90	68
4	HC ČSOB Pojišťovna Pardubice	38	19	3		4	12	128:91	67
5	Bílí Tygři Liberec	38	15	9		1	13	100:90	64
6	PSG Zlín	38	15	5		5	13	81:92	60
7	HC Oceláři Třinec	38	14	3		7	14	109:101	55
8	HC Vítkovice Steel	37	14	4		3	16	100:103	53
9	Rytíři Kladno	37	14	2		3	18	93:109	49
10	HC Kometa Brno	37	12	4		4	17	94:100	48
11	HC Slavia Praha	39	13	2		5	19	98:120	48
12	HC Verva Litvínov	38	11	6		3	18	97:124	48
13	HC Energie Karlovy Vary	38	11	2		4	21	100:120	41
14	BK Mladá Boleslav	39	10	2		5	22	82:122	39

Leading Scorers
	Player	Club		GP	G	A	Pts	+/-	PIM
1	Nedvěd Petr	Liberec		35	17	25	42	5	52
2	Ton Petr	Sparta		38	20	21	41	20	6
3	Duda Radek	Plzeň		38	19	20	39	15	66
4	Koukal Petr	Pardubice		37	16	22	38	13	38
5	Burger Jiří	Vítkovice		36	12	25	37	9	32
6	Tenkrát Petr	Sparta		38	16	19	35	2	26
7	Straka Martin	Plzeň		38	11	24	35	2	14
8	Hübl Viktor	Litvínov		35	15	19	34	4	24
9	Gulaš Milan	Č.Bud.		35	14	20	34	6	40
10	Kolář Jan	Pardubice		38	11	23	34	18	26