Not a bad way to begin your Champions Hockey League journey as the Pinguins Bremerhaven took down CHL alums TPS Turku in a close contest. Pinguins' netminder Brandon Maxwell made 57 stops and Nino Kinder scored the game-winning goal shorthanded to hand the Pinguins their first CHL victory. 

The Pinguins came into the match-up missing their top Slovenian trio, who are on national team duty at the Olympic qualifiers. TPS was battling their own roster changes with 3 of their 4 top scorers having moved on to other clubs. This lack of fire power was felt on both sides of the puck as neither club was able to muster many high-quality scoring chances in the early going. 

Bremerhaven were awarded two powerplays midway through the first frame, but the combined efforts of Turku’s defence and netminder Andrey Kareev dismissed any notion of the Germans breaking the deadlock.

Maxwell had to stay sharp early on in the second period as Turku started to take advantage of some extensive offensive zone time. The home team had a few opportunities to break the ice with a couple of excellent backhanded attempts in close but were unable to solve Maxwell's mit. Kareev wasn’t tested nearly as much but he stood tall when called upon and kept Turku competitive.

Pinguins drew first blood as Bremerhaven's towering defenceman Stanislav Dietz coralled the puck at the blue line and then shot the puck out of a cannon and past a screened Kareev to record the Pinguins' first CHL goal and give his team a 1-0 lead. 

Minutes later, TPS Turku would seem to have leveled the contest but after the official review revealed a high-stick, the goal was negated and TPS were left searching for that evasive first goal.

Down by one, TPS started the third period with some urgency. It was this urgency that led the Pinguins to make some mistakes with the puck and just minutes into the final frame, Mike Moore sailed the puck up and over the glass causing a delay of game penalty and ushering a powerplay to the home team.

However, what appeared to be a blessing for TPS quickly became a curse as Pinguins’ Tye McGinn took advantage of some open ice on the penalty kill and skated into the offensive zone where he wristed a heavy shot from the top of the circle that squeaked past Kareev where fellow Pinguin Nino Kinder was waiting to tap in a short-handed tally increasing the Germans' lead to 2-0.

Turku would have some chances to even it up, including a grade-A opportunity from Jack Rodewald to start the third, but the Pinguins would not yield their game plan as they were content to rest on their laurels and wait for Turku to push the pace.

TPS's Filip Sandberg would add the only Turku tally in the dying seconds of the match, but it would be too little too late for the Finns as Bremerhaven would skate away with two points.