Red Bulls take Game 7 and advance to semi-finals

On Friday, EC Red Bull Salzburg went through to the semis as last team of the Erste Bank Eishockey Liga after beating EC-KAC 5:2. The Red Bulls will host EC VSV on Sunday for the first game of semi-finals while HC Orli Znojmo takes on EHC LIWEST Black Wings Linz. Decisive game seven between EC Red Bull Salzburg and EC-KAC in the quarterfinals. Everything was prepared for a big showdown in Salzburg – losing this game means end of the season, the winner movers up into the semis. Already in the beginning it was obvious that both teams put all their weight into this game. After seven minutes Martin Schumnig opened the scoring on a rebound after Jamie Lundmark only hit the post. Five minutes later John Hughes intercepted a cross pass of KAC and didn’t let the opportunity pass. He won the duel against Bernd Brückler and tied the game. The third powerplay of the Red Bulls brought the lead for Salzburg in the 16th minute: Andreas Kristler slightly deflected a shot of Dominique Heinrich which let the KAC Goalie no chance. Shortly before the end of the first period Walter increased the lead to 3:1 after an inadvertence of the KAC. Only two minutes after the first break the Red Jackets managed to make the game close again. During the first powerplay of Klagenfurt Lundmark scored an onetimer assisted by Oliver Setzinger. In the mid of the second period Manuel Ganahl had the opportunity to tie the game again with a penalty-shot, but he couldn’t get the puck across the goal line. In the third period the KAC tried everything to tie game and opened a couple of chances. But they didn’t handle to crack the stable Red Bull Defense one more time. In the last two minutes the KAC played with empty net and conceded two more goals by Ben Walter and Daniel Welser. With a result of 5:2 the Red Bulls moves up into the semis, where they are hosting the EC VSV on Sunday. EC Red Bull Salzburg – EC-KAC 5:2 (3:1,0:1,2:0) Goals RBS: Hughes (8.), Kristler (16./pp), Walter (20.,59./en), Welser (60./en) Goals KAC: Schumnig (6.), Lundmark (23./pp) Final score in the best-of-seven-series, RBS – KAC: 4:3