At the end of the home game series, the Pioneers Vorarlberg will host KAC and VSV this weekend.
“Red Jackets” come as league leaders
Record champions KAC will begin the trip to the country as league leaders. The team from Klagenfurt has 82 points after 39 games, which means they have already secured their place in the play-offs. After five wins in a row, the record champions suffered their first defeat on Wednesday, narrowly losing 3-2 to Pustertal in Bruneck.
The Pioneers and the KAC have already dueled three times this season. In Feldkirch, Macierzynski & Co celebrated a 2-1 win after a penalty shootout. At Lake Wörthersee, however, from Vorarlberg’s perspective there was nothing to be gained with 2:6 and 2:5. The Nygard cracks were able to annoy the absolute top teams in the league on several occasions, especially on home ice, as the first meeting in November already showed.
With 136 goals scored, the “Rotjackets” have one of the best offensive lines in the entire win2day ICE Hockey League. The Danish striker Mathias From is currently the best scorer for the Carinthians (23G, 23A), and overall the KAC has a very balanced squad with good quality lines.
Erne meets ex-teammates
So far the season has not gone as planned for the Villacher Adler. The Draustadt team are currently only in eleventh place in the table, and with two fewer games played, they are currently one point short of the last pre-play-off place (FTC-Telekom).
In each of the previous meetings this season, the home team came off the ice as the winner. In October, the Villach team won 5-2 in front of their own fans, and in the Vorarlberghalle the Pioneers took all three points in a narrow 5-4 win. After a black streak around the turn of the year, VSV was recently able to recover and win two of the last four games.
While the Eagles’ PowerPlay is one of the top four in the league, Penalty Killing is a problem area. Only the Innsbruck Haie are behind the Carinthians in these statistics. The Pioneers have exactly the opposite picture. While the outnumbered game in particular has always performed well in recent games, the game with one man more remains a construction site.
Pioneer’s player Luca Erne knows the opponent very well, having worn the Villach jersey in the first two direct duels this season. The 21-year-old recently acted together with Mathias Böhm and Aron Summer in a strong fourth line of attack and would like to show off with his current teammates and score important points against his former teammates.
PIV head coach Johannes Nygard will have to do without Daniel Woger and Yannik Lebeda in both upcoming games. “With a view to the upcoming games against KAC and VSV, it is important to consistently pursue the path we have chosen. We have to ensure that we are even more present in front of the opponent’s goal in order to achieve the necessary effectiveness in the end,” the main person behind the board continues.
