With both Leksands IF and Fribourg-Gottéron already through to the next round of this year's Champions Hockey League, that doesn’t mean that either side will take the final two Group Stage games lightly.
While the two teams entered Game Day 5 undefeated, in Group F, both will be looking for a strong end to try and finish top of the group at the end of the first round of action.
On Tuesday night, as the two sides met in Sweden, the advantage went to Fribourg.
Home team Leksand enjoyed a great start to the game, with Carter Camper and Carl Själin opening a two goal lead by the close of the opening twenty minutes, but after that, the game slipped away from them.
Christopher Didiomenco pulled one back for Fribourg just 60 seconds into the second period, and then David Desharnais levelled the scoring midway through, and then less than 30 seconds later, Fribourg had a lead that they would never relinquish through Nathan Marchon.
Two further goals followed in the third period through Ryan Gunderson and Samuel Walser to cap off a comeback victory for Fribourg, to take a 5-2 win in the first of two meetings between the two sides.
For Gunderson, it was a great result for his side.
“It was a bit of a slow start for us, but we came together in the second and got ahead then played well in the third to pull it off”
“The first period was tough, I’d like to blame it on the travel but we’ve got to be better there, fortunately Connor Hughes kept us in and we were able to battle back in the second.
“I just kind of stepped into it and shot, Killian Mottet made a good play to draw in the D and leave it on a tee there."
I just kind of swung as hard as I could and it just found it’s way in.Fribourg forward Ryan Gunderson
“As the Group Stage goes you want to win it, so we came in looking at it as an important game, it’s a good one for now and we’ll see what happens next week.”
For Leksand, it’s their first loss of their debut CHL season, something that frustrated forward Max Veronneau.
“Obviously it’s a tough loss, being up two to nothing early and letting that slide so we’ve got to learn from this and be better.”
“I think we just stopped skating and gave up a couple of goals, they had all the momentum in the second period and we just couldn’t get one back.”
“It was a pretty slow second period, I think we came out pretty flat, I took a bad penalty right at the start and that didn’t help at all.”
Veronneau took a penalty just four seconds into the second period, and the consequential powerplay goal for Friboug really set them on their way for the comeback.
"I’ve just got to know I can’t be reaching for that puck, the guy made a good play, It was just a bad play on my part.”
The two sides return to domestic action now, but will face each other again next week, as the fight for top spot in Group F continues.