Continental Hockey League regular championship 2023/2024. The second match of the game day will be a clash between the former leader of the East conference and the current leader of the same conference. Lada Togliatti will be hosting Metallurg from Magnitogorsk.
Togliatti is currently attempting to minimize the number of lost points until the team leaders stop. Nikita Popugaev and Scott Kosmachuk are still benched with injuries, both being key players for Lada and without them, Togliatti's attacking potential is suffering. It's evident in the matches after the break. In two matches against Avtomobilist and Sibir, which Lada lost, they scored only two goals, although they managed to score four in a victorious match.
On the other hand, if we're talking about minimizing losses, they're doing alright with three points out of the possible six. Currently, Lada is in the fourth position in the conference, with 53 points after 44 matches. Lada scored these points thanks to 18 victories in regular time, four outside of it, and another nine losses with one point. In the rest of the 13 matches, Lada lost without any extra points. Regarding the goals scored, Lada is ranked sixth with 108 goals. The situation is worse when it comes to goals conceded, only seventh place, with the same 109 goals as Magnitka.
Magnitogorsk returned after the break in an absolutely different mood, which has been talked about a lot. They had three streaks before the break. The first was five consecutive losses, then came 11 wins in a row, followed again by four losses consecutively. It seemed as though after the break, after the "balloons", Magnitka should not have been able to perform better, but so far they have two victories in two matches. If they struggled to beat Amur in overtime, they managed to topple Avangard in regular time, nabbing themselves the first position in the league table, which they maintain as they approach this match.
After 43 matches, Magnitka has scored 59 points. Metallurg gained these points thanks to 21 victories in regular time, six beyond it, and another five losses with one point. The remaining 11 matches, Metallurg lost without any extra points. Metallurg is still the best team in the East in terms of goals scored - 133. Regarding conceded goals, as already mentioned, they are sharing the seventh and eighth place in the East - 109 goals.
Lada and Metallurg have played 20 matches. In this confrontation, Lada proved to be stronger in seven meetings, while Magnitka won 13 matches. This season, Lada won twice 4:3 and 3:1, Metallurg was stronger with a score of 4:3 in overtime.
Of course, the favourite of this match is the leader of the Eastern conference. The coefficient for a Lada win is 3.20. And here, I propose to take the victory of Metallurg, after all, the team from Magnitogorsk is very good after a break.
If you do not want to choose someone's victory, then the TO (4.5) at 1.83 looks nice. Both teams concede a lot, and Magnitka also scores a lot, so them scoring at least five goals combined is quite feasible.
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