OLIMPIJA 8 - 4 LINZ
BLACK WINGS CLIPPED AS DRAGONS RETURN TO FORM
LINZ'S DIRTY PLAY PUNISHED WITH ANOTHER 8-GOAL PERFORMANCE
Linz trying to bully us out of this game:
https://tenor.com/en-GB/view/no-spongebob-squarepants-punching-bully-gif-5769171
Lineup changes
Hebar comes in for Kolin as backup goalie - ZG tells me Kolin cut his hand/arm in a vineyard accident, which is the most Central European thing I've ever heard. It's 1-2 weeks so I wish him a speedy recovery. As my friend said to me, perhaps that will be written into his next contract: no vineyard work during the season!!
Gregorc returns so Ćosić sinks down to 7th D. We have a 4th line as Bukovec rejoins the lineup, too. Pance remains on the 2nd line, as Polei isn't back yet. Same for Mehle on the 1st line with Sabla out. It's a real next-man-up situation, like in the NFL!
Stars of the game
* Žiga Mehle (2G 2A) - Finally, Mehle has his breakout game! I knew he had the potential to do something like this and I knew being stuck on the 4th line or in a reserve spot was not helping him get there. Every cloud has a silver lining, as they say, and Mehle has grabbed his injury-replacement top-6 opportunity with both hands. I hope this will be a big confidence boost that will help him start scoring more points from now on.
** Nico Meyer (1G 3A) - Apart from his usual crucial link play in the offensive zone (OZ), he made some important defensive interventions, too, that really impressed me. Our Danish ninja, silent but deadly once more, had key parts to play in all of our first three goals, setting us up with a comfortable cushion for the rest of the game and extinguishing any worries about a post-unbeaten run slump continuing.
*** The refs - a weird one, but hear me out. Think of how we've been treated at the hands of certain refs in certain games over the past couple of seasons. I was really pleased that these refs were very quick to award penalties for Linz's repeated transgressions. They also escalated to a double minor on a high stick when things were at risk of getting out of hand. The vibes are so different under Coach Cooper - we score tons of goals and have (generally) good refereeing decisions (sometimes). What a sea change!
Goals
P1:
OLL - Mehle from Meyer. Mehle is in perfect net-front position to clear up the rebound from Meyer's shot with a backhand scoop.
OLL - Halbert from Meyer and Mehle. Meyer goes wide and finds Halbert crashing the net (moving further up ice) in space. Halbert fires home high over the BWL goalie's left shoulder. Another assured exhibition of his offensive chops after a relatively shaky start to the season in that regard!
OLL PPG - Meyer from Quince and Brennan. Brennan finds Quince at the goalie's left post. Quince swivels to give it back out to an incoming Meyer on Linz's right circle for the one-time goal.
OLL PPG - Brennan from Boychuk and Quince. Brennan, operating from his usual left circle office, squeezes a shot through the near post with 0.3s left in the period!
P2
OLL - Kapel from Gregorc and Beričič. A beautiful toe-drag-release from Kapel that beats the goalie's glove.
OLL - Quince from Brennan. Brennan whips a shot that doinks off both posts and Quince is there to unwittingly knee it in from behind a BWL defender.
OLL - Boychuk from Meyer and Mehle. It's great work from Boychuk to win the puck battle on the boards. Mehle then finds Meyer, who goes wide and flings it backhand to Boychuk for the redirect. Linz had just changed their goalie, but it didn't make much of a difference. Flowing, connected attacking with all three forwards in sync. Coach Cooper hockey is well and truly back!
BWL - Mehle unfortunately breaks his stick while attempting a neutral zone (NZ) pass. Linz go 3 on 2 into our defensive zone (DZ). Horak makes two saves but the third shot attempt goes in. Crnović is the one who missed a clearing opportunity right before the third shot. Anyone got Bohinc's number in Jesenice? 😂 Linz with the reverse-burger goal during our Smash Attack. As I discussed with my friends next to me, surely this means the Linz fans should get a free burger?! It would up the jeopardy considerably!
OLL - Mehle from Brennan. Brennan breaks up a BWL attack in our DZ. Mehle beats a BWL player to the puck, fights through the NZ, weaves out and in and fires a powerful shot into the back of the net from distance. Flashscore didn't credit Brennan for the assist, but they also got other stuff wrong tonight, so I will add it for him.
P3
BWL - In the last 2.5 minutes, we switch off and let Linz sweep into our DZ, culminating in an impressive shot from our right circle that beats Hebar's blocker.
BWL - A pretty stretch pass catches us slacking and St Amant does what he used to do and zooms around Hebar for an easy score. I'm a Pyotr Kochetkov enjoyer (Hurricanes goalie in the NHL famed for wacky poke-checks (when a goalie uses their stick to disrupt an incoming forward)), admittedly, but maybe a proactive poke-check could have helped here?
BWL - A standard shot from just inside the blue line goes in. It looked like Hebar was screened.
Near Misses
P1
619 - An insane diving glove save from the BWL goalie, so insane that it needs to be video reviewed to see if it went over the line.
P3
1200 - Mehle misses the puck on a chance at the back post!
619 - Another 619 near-miss (where's Rey Mysterio?!) and another back post chance - this time it's Pance who can't take advantage of it.
What I liked to see:
- I think we all got a bit worried in the AVS-VIC-HCB stretch of games, where we very nearly lost to Fehervar and then lost convincingly to Vienna and Bolzano. Let me give you a quote below:
- As the Seattle Kraken's new head coach Lane Lambert said last night, "We feel like if we play like that, we’re going to give ourselves a chance to win. Are we going to win all the time? No, but if we play like that, we give ourselves a chance to win...It’s important for our team to understand that what we’re doing is a formula to have success,” Lambert said. “You’re not always going to win, and that’s the way it goes. The outcome was great, but had it been slightly different, I wouldn’t have been unhappy with our hockey team’s effort.” (https://soundofhockey.com/2025/10/12/kraken-win-over-golden-knights-overtime-matty-beniers/).
- I really like this quote (which has gone in my bank of NHL coach comments that I use to help me think about my role as 'coach' of my class at school) because it helps me explain my worries and my relief in our recent games. My worries in that three game stretch were down to our formula for success - namely, fluid passing and puck possession - basically disappearing. The Fehervar penalty win was exhilarating, but I (and I'm sure Coach Cooper) was not happy with the way we played overall. Then, we lost the next two. This game was a big test to see if we could regain our formula for success - we passed with flying colours. Now, let's repeat the process vs HCI tonight.
- As above, I loved to see Mehle explode for 4 points. Obviously, as a teacher, I will have an internal bias towards the promotion of developing young talent. I do think it remains an extremely important thing for the club to do to ensure its sustainability and that it's fulfilling its tacit duty as the only serious hockey club left in Slovenia to promote Slovene talent when it deserves it. Mehle deserves it.
- I did enjoy that Linz's few fans took the 'Auf Wiedersehen' chants very well. It's always nice to see people remember that, as Ilya Bryzgalov says, "Is only game, why you have to be mad?".
What I would like to see:
- This is greedy of me, admittedly, but I would like to see us kick on and score a full 10 goals at some point this season. We were up 8 by the end of the 2nd period, so it was very doable. I understand relaxing a bit at that point, but still - let's see it happen!
- In a similar vein, switching off in P3 can have its downsides. In the last 2.5 minutes of the game, Linz scored three goals with very little contesting from our defence. If Kolin had been in instead of Hebar, one or two of those may have been saved, but it wasn't all the young goalie's fault. Let's do the hockey saying and 'play the full 60', fellas.
- More Žiga Mehle! He's earned a juicy powerplay spot by now, surely. Keep him in the top-6 and let him rip!
- Horak healthy. He took a fly-by hit from a BWL forward and looked like he was in considerable pain. I hope it was just a precaution that Gal Hebar replaced him for the 3rd period.
- Kolin healthy. I am really not anti-Hebar family, but, like Tian, I don't think Gal is ready for regular ICE League action just yet. He made some solid saves to start but, as above, Kolin would have done better with the final three goals.
Final thoughts
Having Sabla and Polei out is quite a big deal for our top-6, yet we dropped another 8-goal bomb regardless. Returning to flowing offense was key for me today and we did that with aplomb. Switching off entirely in the final couple of minutes wasn't so good, but it's a learning moment for the rest of the season.
The main thing, for me, is to marvel at how far Linz have fallen from last season to this season. In my previous two seasons watching Olimpija, they have always been a fierce opponent for us. Their stars, namely Lebler, St Amant and Knott, are still there - but the team looks awful. They didn't have their starting goalie tonight, granted, but it wasn't the goalie that was the main issue. There was barely any connected teamplay at all for the first couple of periods. I'm not a big 'fire the coach' kind of guy, but if I was a Linz fan I would be worried about where my team is headed. Even more so, since this offensive degeneration has coincided with a massive uptick in dirty play, judging by this game. Over and over, they committed egregious penalties and I was really pleased when they finally received a double minor near the end of the 1st period as a warning shot from the refs.
Thankfully, we are on the right side of the equation here. Let's dispatch Innsbruck tonight and rest up for a monster game against Red Bull Salzburg next Friday.
P.S.
Coverage today was sponsored by ED, who came in clutch with a blue Cedevita just when I was resigning myself to a game without one due to all the students in the West Stand making the queues massive. Najlepša hvala, Gospod! I really enjoyed meeting him in person for the first time after lots of high-brow hockey messages back and forth. It remains extremely cool to meet my regular readers and to see a tangible OHB community start to form. Thanks to everyone I've met so far and please don't be shy if you recognise me at a game, say hello!
P.P.S.
I had the unfortunate luck to sit next to a very rowdy drunk man this game. After scaring off a young family with his constant slurred and sweary abuse, he turned to me and said "You don't look robust enough to be a hockey fan" and then repeated himself with "you don't look tough enough to be a hockey fan". Getting unsolicited comments on my body from a drunk man? Now I know how ladies feel! I asked him what a hockey fan is meant to look like but, as you might imagine, didn't receive a tremendously nuanced response. I showed him the OHB Instagram account, but I think he had transcended any ability to read by that point.
Of course, I am tempted to write some unpleasant comments about him here, but I will instead magnanimously focus on the main takeaway. The vast majority of fans do enjoy the games responsibly. However, if you see your friend is going a bit too far, please have a word with them. I can handle some impolite comments, but I was really sad to see a young family in distress over one guy who hasn't worked out his alcohol tolerance yet, despite being 40+. This could put them off hockey for good, right at a time when we should be building our fanbase for the long-term. If you want to go extra hard, go nearer the Ledeni Zmaji, who are fully capable of policing themselves. We're lucky to have ultras who are responsibly-behaved!
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