SPENGLER CUP Day 6: Geneve upsets Moscow in FINAL

GENEVE-SERVETTE  5 - 3  CSKA Moscow

The 2013 Spengler Cup Tournament came to a close in Davos, Switzerland on New Year`s Eve, as it saw a replay of the preliminary round match that was arguably the best game of the 2013 tournament, as the Swiss side Geneve-Servette beat the Favourites CSKA Moscow 4-3 in Overtime.

This time though, it would be only be only one side that would be in this contest as it saw Geneve-Servette lift the 87th annual Spengler Cup to see the Switzerland hockey club win it`s first ever major piece of silverwear in it`s clubs history.

Geneve-Servette got the scoring underway in the final at the 7 minute mark, when a powerplay goal by Juraj Simek saw the forward scored from a rebound.

Alexandre Picard started the play in the Moscow zone after he passed to Garrett Stafford, whose blast was blocked at the front of the net and Simek swooped onto the puck and backhanded home for a 1-0 lead.

Geneve then doubled their lead at 10-25 after Denis Hollenstein scored from a rebound that came off Kevin Romy shot, after the puck was saved originally by Rastislav Stana in the CSKA nets, but the puck came right on the stick of Hollenstein and he dispatched the puck in the nets as the defense was non-existant.

The Swiss National League side shown their dominance more in the game, as they score an early goal in the Second period thanks to Lennart Petrell, who was on hand to guide the puck home after Stana made another save.

The netminder had made a kick save to stop Roland Gerber shot from the angle but saw the puck come straight out towards the front of the net and Petrell got there ahead of the Russian defenseman and made it 3-0 at 23-48.

CSKA then found themselves 4-0 down in the contest at 36-21, after the Russian side won the faceoff in their own zone and then Igor Fefelov poked it into the path of Geneve defenseman Daniel Vukovic. His blast was blocked at the front of the net, but saw Kevin Romy turn the puck in just as he was falling to the ice as CSKA was getting embarrassed now and this game was turning into a romp for the Swiss side now.

CSKA pulled a goal back at 39-00 through Oleg Saprykin as he made it 4-1 with the CSKA forward diverting the puck home, with the Russians looking to try and work their way back into this final.

In the final period, CSKA Moscow started to buck up their ideas with an early powerplay goal at 41:15. As Alexander Frolov scored a nice skilful goal, after he pinched the puck off Petrell stick in the attacking zone and then stick handled his way past a sliding defenseman and then by the netminder, who had come out of his crease as he slid it home for a 4-2 scoreline and the aftermath of the goal saw both teams come together in a scrum.

With time ticking down the Russians pulled another goal back thanks to Nikita Zaitsev as he made it 4-3 and set up an exciting finale to the game.

Frolov for CSKA had battled hard for the puck behind the Geneve net on the 3^rd goal for Moscow, Frolov then dished a pass out to Zaitsev and he fired past Robert Mayer for a one goal game at 56-31.

The Swiss side called for a time out with under 3 minutes to go in the game and with CSKA going in search for the goal to tie the game, pulled the goalie for the extra attacker with over a minute left.

Moscow lost possession in the neutral zone and saw Goran Bezina and Matthew Lombardi combine to set up Kaspars Daugavins who slotted past the last defenseman for a 5-3 empty net goal at 59-00 to lead Geneve-Servette to their Spengler Cup triumph and beat the pre-tournament favourites twice in the tournament.