Matchday Recap: S01D25
Matchday 25 came at us from every direction—shootout thrillers, a lopsided shellacking at The Salt Pavilion, and a pair of overtime barnburners that had me reaching for my second coffee well past midnight. C'est une belle journée pour le hockay, mes amis. Let's get into it.
MTL 1 — PRA 0
They played sixty-plus minutes of hockay at The Oldest Rink and produced exactly one goal. And yet, I'm not sure I've seen a more compelling game on Matchday 25.
The first period set the tone immediately—Catherine Lavoie opened the hitting at 2:32 and the Phantoms answered right back through Adam Fiala and the thunderous Jakub Černý. Neither goaltender blinked. Period two escalated beautifully: Amélie Bouchard answering David Růžička's early crunching check with one of her own, before Lucas Pelletier—having already been flattened by Růžička—stepped up on him again at 14:59 and the gloves came off. Both men took coincidental majors and the scoreboard stayed clean.
Regulation? Scoreless. Overtime? Still scoreless through fifteen minutes of grinding, physical hockay that had the Oldest Rink crowd on its feet. It went to a shootout, and it was Jean-François Tremblay—who'd taken two trips to The Sixth himself tonight—who buried the winner at 4:31 of Period 5. Poetic justice for a man who took his lumps and kept coming back. The Montréal Maples take two points in a game that felt like it deserved about six. Quel match.
VLA 6 — STO 5
Mon Dieu. Where do I even begin with this one at The Last Terminal?
Six goals in the first period alone—three apiece—with Filip Nyström and Albin Nordlund striking early for Stockholm and Darya Kuznetsova, Denis Baranov, and Artyom Volkov doing the damage for Vladivostok. The ice was barely scraped before 3-3 was already on the board. Period two saw a Filip Nyström penalty produce a Nikita Sorokin power play goal for the Vodkas, before Viktor Hallberg—assisted by Nordlund—leveled it at 4-4. Then Vera Orlova and Hugo Wikström decided the score wasn't dramatic enough and traded punches at center ice, both heading off for five each.
Period three was, if anything, wilder: Elin Sjöberg and Denis Baranov traded goals within 36 seconds of each other to make it 5-5. Then Anastasia Ivanova and Albin Nordlund immediately dropped the gloves. Then Maxim Petrov and Axel Lindqvist. Then Denis Baranov and Klara Åström. Four fights across the night, bodies everywhere. Overtime, and it's Petrov—who'd already fought and scored—who ends it at 12:13 with a beauty off an Igor Zaytsev feed. C'est incroyable. Baranov (2G, 1A, 1 fight), Sorokin (1G, 2A), and Nordlund (1G, 2A, 1 fight) were magnificent. The Vladivostok Vodkas survive a war.
HEL 1 — TOK 2
An upset at The Dark Sauna—and the odds said it could go either way (Helsinki at 1.90, Tokyo at 1.91), so perhaps "upset" is generous, but the Howlers were at home and the Titans came in and stole the points.
Aoi Yamamoto gave Tokyo the lead in the first at 11:27, assisted by a relentless Mio Kobayashi who'd been eating hits from Elina Heikkinen all night and kept coming back. Heikkinen was the game's most physical presence—three credited hits, including two on Kobayashi—but it was Erik Johansson who answered for Helsinki in period two with a Petteri Salonen assist at 4:26, the same Salonen who'd been in a legitimate brawl with Sōta Watanabe in the first. Tied at one.
Period three was scoreless despite the Howlers pressing. Overtime the same—fifteen minutes of desperate defending by both sides. The shootout, then, and it was Yuki Sato who calmly picked the corner at 11:31 to win it for Tokyo. The Titans grind out a road win in a tight, physical game that could have gone either way right until that final shot. Well earned.
RIM 4 — ANC 0
If you wanted to see Rimini doing what Rimini does best—relentless forechecking, opportunistic power play goals, and enough physicality to fill a highlight reel—The Coastal Pavilion delivered in full.
The Rinklers drew blood early when Lorenzo Fabbri buried a power play goal at 6:56 in the first, Marco Rossetti picking up the assist. By then, the hitting had already been severe—Sofia Barbieri in particular was an absolute presence along the boards, lining up Mason Kluane, Bryce Denison, and Levi Simmonds throughout the night. The Anchorage Auroras weren't shy about hitting back, but they couldn't solve the Rimini net.
Luca Ferretti made it 2-0 early in the second, Rossetti assisting again—his second of the night—and Alessandro Conti capitalized on a third-period power play at 1:54 off a Francesca Serra feed to make it 3-0. Nico De Luca added the insurance at 3:55. Three separate fights—Elena Moretti/Heather Braund, Sofia Barbieri/Mason Kluane, and Mason Kluane/Davide Marchetti—gave the Auroras some moral victories, but the scoreboard was unambiguous. Rimini shuts it out. Marco Rossetti's two-assist night was the quiet engine that drove this whole performance.
WPG 3 — JBG 2
The oddsmakers had Johannesburg as favorites at 1.77 versus Winnipeg's 1.77—wait, no, let me correct that: the Jaguars were listed at 1.77 to the Wendigos' 2.06. So this is an upset, and it's a good one.
The Cold Lodge was rowdy from the drop. Three fights in the first two minutes—Tara Ridsdale and Thandiwe Radebe, then Lindiwe Sithole and Anna Flett, then Thabo Mokoena and Dylan Fife—before the period was even done. Tyler Chicken gave Winnipeg the early lead at 13:56 off a Brody Flett assist. The Jaguars came storming back in period two though, with Sipho Nkosi and Bongani Mthembu both finding the net to make it 2-1 for Johannesburg heading into the third.
That's when Winnipeg dug in. Dylan Fife—who'd fought Mokoena earlier—answered at 1:53 assisted by Leah Blacksmith. Then Kaya Bearclaw, set up beautifully by Anna Flett, buried what would prove to be the winner at 10:30. Johannesburg pressed but couldn't finish. The Wendigos hold on for a 3-2 win that nobody in the oddsmaking community saw coming. Bravo à Winnipeg.
MUM 1 — MCM 8
There is no gentle way to say this: the McMurdo Monoliths scored six goals in the first period against the Mumbai Monsoons at The Salt Pavilion, and then kept going.
It started inside four minutes. Sanjay Pawar and Rahul Nair each took penalties in short order, and the Monoliths made Mumbai pay twice on the power play—Sven Lindberg at 3:36, then Diego Fuentes at 4:40. Yumi Takeda, Amira Hassan, Diego Fuentes again, and Ingrid Solheim followed in quick succession. Six goals in one period, folks. The game was functionally over before the Zamboni had done its first turn.
Yumi Takeda added a seventh early in period two, and while Kiran Bhatt deserves credit for dropping the gloves with Amira Hassan and giving the home crowd something to cheer at 8:00—and Vikram Joshi's late consolation goal at 12:25 in period three was a small dignity—this was a rout of historic proportions. Chris Elliot's three assists are as quietly devastating as anything else on the scoresheet. Fuentes and Takeda each finished with two goals. The Mumbai Monsoons will need to watch this tape and ask hard questions. McMurdo, meanwhile, boards the plane home with eight goals and no apologies.
HAV 4 — SAO 3
The Rhythm Bureau lived up to its name on Matchday 25—a back-and-forth affair between the Havana Hammers and the São Paulo Serpents that kept swinging rhythms all the way into overtime.
The teams traded goals in the first, with Yoandri Hernández opening the scoring for Havana and Isabela Costa answering on the power play for São Paulo. Period two saw Yarelys González cash a Havana man-advantage goal before Rafael Oliveira leveled it again at 2-2. Yordanis Sánchez was everywhere tonight—four credited hits, a trip to The Sixth, and ultimately the overtime winner—but he had to wait his turn. Period three delivered more drama: Amanda Barbosa gave Havana a 3-2 lead at 12:44, only for Reinier Cruz to tie it at 14:43 with barely over a minute left in regulation. The crowd at The Rhythm Bureau must have been apoplectic.
Overtime arrived, and at 4:06—barely four minutes in—Yordanis Sánchez ended it, set up perfectly by Claudia Pérez, who now has two assists on the night. Sánchez is the kind of player who earns wins. A well-fought victory for the Hammers.
GDL 4 — PER 1
El Rincón Perdido hosted a clean, decisive Guadalajara Gatos performance against a Perth Pyres side that showed heart but couldn't match the home team's finishing. At even odds (1.90 apiece), there was no narrative going in—just hockay, and the Gatos played better hockay.
Carlos Morales opened the scoring at 4:37 in the first, assisted by Andrés Rojas, then Daniela Salazar made it 2-0 just minutes later. Perth's Gemma Fletcher—one of the few bright spots for the Pyres all night—pulled one back at 11:34 off an Oscar Whitfield assist, and briefly the game was interesting again. But Guadalajara shut it down and opened it back up in period two.
Andrés Rojas scored twice in the second period—at 5:26 and 12:03—to put the game definitively out of reach. The Perth Pyres managed just the nine shots that mattered at the beginning and never really threatened after Fletcher's goal. Rojas finishes with two goals and an assist; Carlos Morales with a goal and an assist. Guadalajara looked like a team that knew what they were doing from the first shift. The Pyres leave Mexico with nothing.
USH 3 — BUS 1
Another upset on Matchday 25—the Busan Blizzards came in as favorites at 1.85 but left The South Passage empty-handed as the Ushuaia Undertow took control and didn't let go.
Matías Fernández got the Undertow going at 8:24 in the first, but Hye-jin Choi answered barely a minute later for Busan to level it. Fernández was central to the game's physical narrative too—he got into a fight with Jae-won Kim at 12:06, both taking five minutes. The game went into the second tied, and that's when Ushuaia took the wheel.
Nicolás Sosa gave them the lead at 12:28 in the middle period, Martina Vega setting the table. The Blizzards couldn't answer, and in the third, it was Vega herself—now as finisher—who buried a power play goal at 8:35, Julieta Ríos with the helper. Credit to Eun-bi Han who took two penalties in the third that kept the pressure on Busan's penalty kill, and it cost them. Hyun-woo Kwon was penalized twice as well. The Undertow managed a relatively clean game physically (just six hits total) and let their skating and structure win this one. Martina Vega—a goal and an assist—was the difference.
DKR 7 — NRB 1
Quelle surprise. The Nairobi Narwhals came in as favorites at 1.74—the Dakar Djinns were listed at 2.10—and the Narwhals got run out of The Sandy Parlor in one of the most convincing upsets of the season.
Dakar was flying from the drop. Khady Bâ opened the scoring at 6:12, Mamadou Guèye doubled it at 11:29 off Bâ's assist, and Ibrahima Sarr added a power play goal right at the buzzer of the first to make it 3-0. The Narwhals' Moses Okello pulled one back in period two at 5:17, but that was as close as Nairobi ever got. Mariama Cissé answered almost immediately at 14:07 to restore the three-goal cushion.
Period three was a Djinn parade. Modou Diouf—who'd fought Nyambura Kamau in the first—scored at 5:46. Moussa Ndiaye added another at 11:41. Cissé, magnificent all night, closed the books at 14:26 off a Cheikh Fall assist for her second goal of the game and a 7-1 final. Abdoulaye Touré's two assists were the quiet orchestration behind several of those third-period efforts. A statement night from Dakar. The Narwhals, the oddsmakers, and frankly everyone watching had their assumptions corrected in no uncertain terms.
Matchday 25 is in the books—two shootouts, three overtime games, a handful of upsets, and enough fights to keep the penalty box doors well-oiled. The standings shift, the stakes climb, and we do it all again soon. Until then, je vous dis bonne nuit, Hockay. Take care of yourselves out there.
—JM Laflèche, Voice of Hockay
Le Council acknowledges that Matchday 25 occurred. Eleven games were played. Goals were scored. Le Council notes, without further comment, that six first-period goals were permitted by a single team and declines to elaborate on what this means for the sport.