Matchday Recap: S01D32
Seven upsets. Two shutouts—one of them 9-0. Winnipeg scoring ten. The Tokyo Titans are doing something that demands attention, and Matchday 32 was the most unforgiving evening the league has produced in weeks. The favorites lost more often than they won, and the teams that were supposed to roll went quietly. Bienvenue dans le chaos.
MTL 6 — PER 2
The Perth Pyres arrived at The Oldest Rink as 1.66 favorites. They left having conceded four goals before the game was eight minutes old. The Montréal Maples, listed at 2.23, were not interested in playing the role the odds had assigned them.
The first period was breathtaking in its pace. A Dmitri Volkov minor at 1:13 gave Perth their opening—Tahlia Nguyen converted the power play at 2:05, Gemma Fletcher assisting. Then Montréal turned it on: Simon Côté at 2:28, Élodie Gagnon at 2:38, Catherine Lavoie at 3:58. Three goals in 90 seconds, and The Oldest Rink was roaring. Marc-Antoine Dufresne added a fifth at 12:25 off a Gagnon helper. Four-one Montréal after one period—the game was effectively over before intermission.
The second period brought two fights—Zara Patel and Gagnon, then Jean-René Bergeron and Liam O'Brien—but Jean-François Tremblay threaded through all of it, scoring at 10:21 off a Dufresne pass. Gemma Fletcher pulled one back for Perth at 14:59, a consolation goal at best.
Tremblay added his second of the night in the third at 8:17, Alexandre Paquette with the helper. Two goals, one assist, and a commanding home performance. Montréal are building something real at The Oldest Rink.
HAV 1 — USH 3
The Ushuaia Undertow came to The Rhythm Bureau as 1.77 favorites—and made good on it, despite a game that spent the better part of two periods trying to become a fight instead of a hockey match. Twenty-three hits. Three brawls. One tight goal that held for an hour.
The first period's decisive moment came from the unlikeliest source—Camila Aguirre, who'd just absorbed an Orlando Machado hit seconds earlier, finished off a Tomás Peralta feed at 6:45. A goal off a hit. Lisandra Álvarez and Valentina Giménez dropped the gloves at 12:08, both off for matching majors.
The second period was pure attrition. No goals, but ten hits and another fight—Yarelys González and Santiago Figueroa trading punches at 10:40. Havana couldn't manufacture a response and Ushuaia wasn't giving anything away.
The third period decided it in a rush. Agustín Medina and Reinier Cruz fought at 6:26—coincidental majors—and six seconds after the majors were handed out, Florencia Ramos found the back of the net off a Valentina Giménez pass. Two-nothing. Yoandri Hernández finally got Havana on the board at 11:01—Claudia Pérez assisting—but Luciana Romero sealed it at 14:28 with Santiago Figueroa helping. A professional road win for Ushuaia in a hostile building.
NRB 4 — MCM 5
A coin flip on paper—Nairobi Narwhals at 1.89, McMurdo Monoliths at 1.92—and it played like one. Nine goals, a Ji-hoon Baek hat trick, and a game that wasn't settled until the fourteenth minute of the third. McMurdo leave The Ochre Reserve with two points that weren't guaranteed.
McMurdo led after one through a Ji-hoon Baek strike at 10:14, Ingrid Solheim assisting. The second period swung back toward Nairobi: Faith Wanjiru converted a power play at 1:45 off an Akinyi Ochieng feed, then scored again at 10:44—Brian Kipchoge with the helper—to give the Narwhals a 2-1 lead. Amira Hassan equalized for the Monoliths at 12:42, Lars Henriksen assisting. Two-two at the second horn.
Then the third period erupted. Amara Osei put Nairobi ahead at 1:44 on a power play—Wanjiku Mwangi assisting. Chris Elliot immediately leveled it, Ji-hoon Baek with the helper. Then Baek scored himself at 4:47 with Diego Fuentes assisting, and added his third—a beauty at 8:19 off a Kofi Mensah pass—to give McMurdo a 5-3 lead that looked safe. Zawadi Mutua made it 5-4 at 14:00, Nairobi refusing to concede, but time expired. Ji-hoon Baek: hat trick, one assist, and the performance of the matchday.
WPG 10 — DKR 1
Dieu du ciel. The Dakar Djinns came to The Cold Lodge and were handed ten goals. The Winnipeg Wendigos, favored at 1.74, decided Matchday 32 was the night to remind everyone exactly what they're capable of.
The first period was controlled: Tara Ridsdale opened at 3:25 off a Curtis Favel feed, Tyler Chicken added a second at 11:51—Kaya Bearclaw with the helper—and Winnipeg led 2-0 without breaking a sweat.
The second period turned into a procession. Two fights bookended the scoring—Khady Bâ and Nicole Flett at 1:18, Jonas Brevik and Awa Diop at 4:58—but neither changed the arithmetic. Leah Blacksmith on the power play, Dylan Fife, Brody Flett, Marissa Spence on another power play. Six-nothing. Ousmane Diallo took a pair of penalties to help Winnipeg's cause. Dakar couldn't create anything.
The third was the closing argument. Tyler Chicken struck again at 0:51, Curtis Favel at 3:19, Dylan Fife at 6:42. Abdoulaye Touré got Dakar their only goal at 8:39—Cheikh Fall assisting, a small consolation on a brutal evening—and Anna Flett added the tenth at 14:10 off a Dylan Fife feed. Kaya Bearclaw finished with three assists. Tyler Chicken had two goals and an assist. The Cold Lodge hasn't seen a performance like this in recent memory.
BUS 0 — ANC 2
The Anchorage Auroras are becoming a problem for the betting markets. Priced at 2.13 against a 1.72 Busan Blizzards side on home ice, they walked out of The Frozen Dock with a clean sheet and two points. Heather Braund, again, was the thread connecting everything.
The first period was scoreless and physical—Busan picked up three penalties and the Auroras absorbed the pressure without conceding. The game felt like it was building to something, but neither goaltender gave an inch.
Sierra Peters broke the deadlock in the second at 10:35. Heather Braund with the assist. One-nothing, and The Frozen Dock went quiet.
The third got combative. Molly Kavairlook and So-hee Hwang dropped the gloves at 2:49—coincidental majors—and ten minutes later Soo-yeon Park and Sierra Peters did the same at 11:57, also matching majors. Peters had started the fight and still had the composure to stay sharp. Carlos Medina put it away at 12:46 with Levi Simmonds assisting, and that was it. Anchorage shutout the favored home side for the second matchday running. At some point, the odds will catch up. They haven't yet.
HEL 0 — GDL 2
The Helsinki Howlers were shutout at The Dark Sauna. Let that sit for a moment. The Guadalajara Gatos came in at 1.98—mild underdogs against a 1.83 Helsinki side—and produced a clinically efficient defensive performance with two goals and nineteen hits. Sometimes the numbers don't tell you the whole story.
Emilio Delgado put the Gatos ahead at 4:37 of the first, Jimena Castillo with the setup, converting after the game's early penalties had canceled out. Helsinki pushed throughout the second—Juhani Rantanen landing four hits over the course of the game in some of the most physical work you'll see from a defenseman—but the Howlers couldn't find the net. Aleksi Korhonen took a penalty at 1:41 that the Gatos didn't capitalize on, but the pattern was set: Guadalajara absorbing and suffocating.
Liisa Nieminen and Rantanen both took minors in the third. Rantanen's penalty—his second of the evening—proved decisive: Andrés Rojas converted on the power play at 9:49, Alejandra Ríos threading the pass. Two-nothing, and Helsinki's goaltender did everything asked of him while his skaters couldn't manufacture a chance. A well-earned road upset for Guadalajara.
SAO 3 — STO 5
The Stockholm Sirens came to The Green Canopy as 2.15 underdogs against a 1.71 São Paulo Serpents side and imposed themselves from the opening minute. Axel Lindqvist scored twice. Felipe Carvalho fought back for São Paulo. In the end, it wasn't enough.
Maja Forsberg at 1:30 off a Filip Nyström feed gave Stockholm the early lead, and Klara Åström doubled it at 10:50—Elin Sjöberg assisting. Felipe Carvalho pulled one back for the Serpents at 13:51, Amanda Barbosa helping, to send São Paulo into the intermission within one. Hugo Wikström extended Stockholm's lead early in the second at 1:20, Lucas Bredberg assisting. Three-one.
São Paulo had their third-period push. Gabriel Rodrigues scored at 2:59 off a Larissa Souza feed, and Isabela Costa converted a power play at 11:06 with Camila Ferreira assisting—3-4, a genuine game on. But Lindqvist answered both times: at 7:29 off Freja Sandström's pass to make it 4-2, then again at 12:39—Nyström with his second helper of the night—to close it at 5-3. The Serpents had runs but no finish. Stockholm leave The Green Canopy with a statement win.
PRA 4 — MUM 1
The Stone Opera hosted a war. Twenty-five hits. Fourteen penalties. Six fights. And through it all, the Prague Phantoms delivered on their 1.59 odds with a composure that the Mumbai Monsoons simply couldn't match. You'd never have known it from the first period, which the visitors dominated.
Two fights before the game was four minutes old—Tomáš Novák and Kiran Bhatt at 2:04, Priya Sharma and Eliška Veselá at 3:21—and then Ananya Kulkarni buried a power play goal at 12:08 off a Meera Naik pass to give Mumbai a 1-0 lead. The Phantoms had been battered and were trailing.
Prague turned it around in the second. Ananya Kulkarni picked up a penalty seconds into the period—and within six minutes Markéta Polák and Kulkarni were fighting again, coincidental majors. Pavel Krejčí equalized at 5:29, Kateřina Dvořáková assisting, and Jakub Černý made it 2-1 just 12 seconds later off an Eliška Veselá feed. Two goals in two minutes.
The third brought three more fights—Barbora Králová and Kavya Iyer, Priya Sharma and Dvořáková, Ondřej Marek and Aditya Rao—and between the chaos, Lucie Šťastná and Tereza Horáková combined for two more goals in 35 seconds: 9:10 and 9:45, each assisting the other. Four-one, and it wasn't close anymore. Prague grinding through everything Mumbai brought and still winning cleanly.
JBG 5 — VLA 2
The Vladivostok Vodkas were 1.83 favorites at Die Goue Myn. The Johannesburg Jaguars were 1.99. The Jaguars led 2-0 after the first period and never looked back. Another upset—and one the Jaguars made look surprisingly comfortable.
Naledi Khumalo opened the scoring at 1:45, Thabo Mokoena with the assist. Nomsa Mahlangu doubled it at 5:47, Thandiwe Radebe with the helper. Two-nothing after one, and Vladivostok's offense had gone quiet against a defense that was prepared for them.
The second period tightened. Mandla Zulu extended Johannesburg's lead at 5:12 off a Jaco van der Merwe pass, then Vladivostok struck twice in 11 seconds: Tatiana Novikova at 5:23 with Igor Zaytsev assisting, and Anastasia Ivanova at 10:32 off a Kirill Morozov feed. Three-two. Artyom Volkov and Pieter Botha fought between those goals—coincidental majors—and the Vodkas had momentum.
The Jaguars absorbed it and answered in the third. Mandla Zulu's second of the night at 12:14—Thandiwe Radebe with her second assist—made it 4-2, and Sipho Nkosi sealed it at 12:58, Lindiwe Sithole with the helper. Zulu's brace, Radebe's playmaking, and a disciplined defensive third. Johannesburg prove again they are not to be underestimated on home ice.
TOK 9 — RIM 0
I don't know what to tell you about the Tokyo Titans right now other than: watch out. The Rimini Rinklers came to The Neon Crossing as 1.68 favorites—the kind of number that implies a comfortable road win. They were shutout 9-0. C'est incroyable.
Yuki Sato scored at 0:30. Thirty seconds in. Aoi Yamamoto added a second at 1:12. By the time Yūma Hayashi and Mei Fujita scored at 4:40 and 4:56 respectively, Tokyo was up four goals and the game was gone. A Hina Takahashi–Davide Marchetti fight in the final minute of the first added flavour, but the result was already settled.
The second brought five more goals to none, bringing it to six. Haruto Nakamura at 5:17 off a Sakura Shimizu pass, then Shūta Tanaka at 14:59 with Mei Fujita assisting. Nine hits from Tokyo in the period and constant pressure on a Rinklers side that couldn't find answers.
Yūma Hayashi and Francesca Serra fought in the third—coincidental majors at 10:11—which barely registered as news by that point. Hayashi had already scored his second at 8:42. Fujita added her second at 9:20. Riku Mori finished it at 11:49. Nine goals, no fights in the first two periods that mattered, and a complete performance from a team that has now shutout a favored opponent while scoring nine. The Titans are playing a different game right now.
Seven upsets. Winnipeg scoring ten. Tokyo scoring nine. Ji-hoon Baek with a hat trick. Prague winning through a brawl. Two favored home sides shutout. Matchday 32 didn't hold back, and the standings are going to reflect that. I'll see you for Matchday 33—bring your expectations, and be ready to abandon them.
—JM Laflèche, Voice of Hockay
Le Council acknowledges that Matchday 32 occurred. Seven results were inconsistent with pre-game expectations. Forty-nine goals were scored. Le Council notes that the Winnipeg Wendigos scored ten goals in a single game and has no further comment at this time. The record has been updated accordingly.