Tuesday marks the end of the Swedish Hockey League regular season, but Swedish play-off hockey begins on Monday evening from the 2nd division: the HockeyAllsvenskan.
Both the HAS and the SHL follow the same format for their play-offs:
- The bottom two teams play a best-of-seven game series to determine who stays in the league and who gets relegated.
- The four teams that finished 7th to 10th compete in a Round of 16 stage, with 7th versus 10th and 8th versus 9th in best-of-three game series.
- The winners of those two series join the teams that finished in the top 6 for the Quarter Finals.
First up this week we start the relegation play-off and determine which two teams make it through to the Quarter Finals.
Relegation Play-off: Östersunds IK vs Västerviks IK
Östersunds and Västerviks will fight to stay in the HAS over a best-of-seven game series.
Östersunds finished 13th on 50 points. They spent 10 years in the HockeyEttan (3rd division) before promotion at the end of the 2021-22 season. They narrowly kept out of the relegation play-off last season by finishing 12th, but now have to fight to stay in the league this time around. Their offense is led by Johan Mörnsjö (16 Goals, 13 Assists, 29 total points) and Viktor Granholm (14 Goals, 14 Assists, 28 total points).
Västerviks finished 14th on 38 points, losing their last 8 games in a row. They are in their 8th consecutive season in the HockeyAllsvenskan. They finished last season bottom of the HAS but were saved from relegation due to the financial problems of Vita Hästen. They’ve benefitted from no such luck this time around and it looks like an uphill battle to avoid relegation. They are reliant on captain Anton Svensson to continue to lead the way on and off the ice. He led the team with 32 points (11 Goals, 21 Assists) and has scored a point in each of the last four games.
R16: Kalmar HC vs BIK Karlskoga
7th-placed Karlskoga face 10th-placed Kalmar in a short best-of-three series, with the winner qualifying for the Quarter Finals. There were only six points between them at the end of the 52-game regular season, so the teams are more closely matched than is sometimes the case in this part of the bracket.
Kalmar finished the season losing four of their last five games; however that included losses to three of the top four teams (Brynäs, AIK and Djurgårdens). The attack was led by Canadian defender Tim Theocharidis who led all defensemen in the HAS with 43 points in his first season playing in Europe. Finnish forward Teemu Lepaus finished two points behind him with 41 points in his first season in Sweden.
Karlskoga’s end-of-season form was the exact opposite of their Round of 16 opponent. They finished the regular season winning four games out of five, seeing a four-game winning streak ended on Friday by Mora in a 3-2 loss. They will benefit from having Victor Brattström between the pipes. He did a good job in the SHL for Färjestad as temporary cover when Max Lagacé and Carl Lindbom were both out injured at the start of the year and has conceded just seven goals across his five appearances since joining Karlskoga on loan in mid-February.
R16: Almtuna IS vs Nybro Vikings
Only one point separated 9th-placed Almtuna and 8th-placed Nybro in the regular season and that’s just one of many reasons why this best-of-three series is too close to call.
Almtuna have the edge in the face-to-face series this season, winning three of the four games between the two sides including the most recent: a 2-1 victory on February 9th. However, after that victory they conceded 35 goals over the following 10 games, including a 10-0 humiliation at the hands of Karlskoga, as they stumbled towards the finishing line.
In contrast, Nybro have won five of their last six games to complete a successful first season in the HockeyAllsvenskan after last year’s promotion campaign from the HockeyEttan. Their points-scoring has been led by one of the heroes from that group: Eero Savilahti. The Finn has been almost at a point-per-game, scoring 42 in 45 appearances, and has been red-hot down the stretch with 15 points from his last 10 games.
As for Almtuna, the have two players taken in the 2020 NHL draft to look out for: Alexander Ljungkrantz, a 3rd-round selection of the New York Islanders, and Elliot Ekmark, a 7th-round selection by the Florida Panthers.
Further Info
Full series schedules can be found on the official website: https://www.hockeyallsvenskan.se/
In the UK, all games are available to watch live and on-demand via the Home of Hockey subscription service.
