Munich, Germany - With five games left in the regular season, Berlin continues to be the hottest candidate for the number one seed. Friday night, the Eisbären extended their lead over the Kölner Haie to seven points with a win over Schwenningen, which suffered its 13th loss in a row. Battling for the final playoff berth, Hamburg and Iserlohn both had to go to overtime action in their respective games. At the bottom of the table, the Augsburger Panther clashed with Bavarian rival ERC Ingolstadt.

Young defenseman Patrick Köppchen scored his first two goals of the season and Ted Drury notched the game-winner as the Hamburg Freezers edged the Düsseldorfer EG Metro Stars 4-3 (2-2, 1-1, 0-0, 1-0). Düsseldorf was up 2-0 just seven minutes into the game after back-to-back powerplay tallies from Jean-Francois Quintin and Fabian Brännström. Two point shots from Köppchen, one on the man advantage, evened the score at 2-2 going into the first intermission. The Metro Stars re-claimed the lead with five minutes to go in the second. On a shorthanded breakaway, Rainer Zerwesz ripped a slapshot from the left faceoff circle past Hamburg’s goalie Boris Rousson. But Hamburg came right back. Just two minutes later, Scott Lachance tied the contest at 3-3, converting a feed by Ted Drury from behind the net on the man advantage. After a scoreless third, Drury scored the game-winner in the OT shootout to give Hamburg two important points in the battle for a playoff spot. Adding injury to insult, the Metro Stars lost Austrian defenseman Martin Ullrich for the rest of the season after re-aggravating an ACL injury. Zerwesz will miss a couple of games after fracturing his right thumb.

Kölner Haie get rare shootout win

In Nuremberg, Tim Leahy lifted the Kölner Haie to a rare 3-2 (1-1, 1-1, 0-0, 1-0) shootout win over the Nürnberg Ice Tigers. Cologne is just 4-13 in OT decisions on the season. Thriving Dave Tomlinson put the Tigers ahead late in the first. Goals from defender Brad Schlegel and Dwayne Norris shortly before and after the break gave Cologne a 2-1 lead. But Tigers defenseman Shawn Anderson tied the game at 2-2 less than a minute after Norris’s goal. Nuremberg kept pressing for the win, but did not manage to get the puck past Chris Rogles again.

League-leading scorer Marc Beaufait and defenseman Keith Aldridge each scored a pair of goals as the first-place Berlin Eisbären cruised to an easy 5-2 (2-1, 2-1, 1-0) victory over the hapless Schwenninger Wild Wings, who recorded their 13th straight loss. Beaufait also had an assist as Berlin outshot the hapless Wings 47-19. Youngster Mark Etz gave Schwenningen an early 1-0 lead, but the Eisbären turned the momentum before the first intermission with powerplay goals from Aldridge and Beaufait. Beaufait doubled the lead to 3-1 early in the middle frame, but All-Star Francois Fortier put Schwenningen back on the map with a shorthanded goal shortly after. Rob Shearer re-installed Berlin’s two-goal lead with a powerplay tally late in the period, before Aldridge’s second of the night put the game away 3:40 into the final stanza.

Defenseman Jeff MacLeod scored the only goals of the night as the Kassel Huskies balnked the Mannheim Adler at home, 1-0 (0-0, 1-0, 0-0). Huskies netminder Rich Parent recorded his league-leading sixth shutout of the season. MacLeod scored 3:52 into the second, knocking the rebound of Sven Valenti’s centering feed past Adler netminder Mike Rosati.

Chasing Hamburg: King’s hat trick helps Iserlohn

Former ECHL MVP Scott King scored a hat trick, including the game-tying goal with 12 seconds to go as the Iserlohn Roosters edged the Frankfurt Lions on the road, 5-4 (3-2, 0-0, 1-2, 1-0). Defenseman Chris Snell scored a pair of first-period goals for the Lions. After falling behind 2-1 midway through the first, Iserlohn put on a little rally and took a 3-2 lead into the first intermission behind goals from Petr Fical and King. Frankfurt turned the momentum early in the third when Rick Girard tied the contest at 3-3 on the man advantage. The Lions seemed headed for a home win when Pat LeBeau made it 4-3 with less than three minutes to go in regulation. But with an extra attacker on, King’s hot hand struck again to send the game into a shootout decision, where Andrej Podkonicky converted the game-winning penalty shot.
Iserlohn continues to trail Hamburg by five points in the battle for the final playoff berth.

Wally Schreiber and defenseman Edvin Frylen scored only 56 seconds apart in the third-period to give the Hannover Scorpions a 2-0 (0-0, 0-0, 2-0) road win over the hapless Krefeld Pinguine. Krefeld dominated the game, but Hannover showed more determination, skating to their second straight win after the firing of head coach Paulin Bordeleau last weekend.

Augsburg edges Ingolstadt in Bavarian derby

Sergej Vostrikov converted the game-winning penalty shot as the Augsburger Panther edged ERC Ingolstadt 3-2 (0-0, 1-0, 1-2) after shootout. With the win, 12th-place Augsburg extended the gap to its Bavarian rival in the standings to four points. After a scoreless first, Reid Simonton put Augsburg on the scoreboard midway through the second, burying the rebound of Chris Armstrong’s shot on the man advantage. Ingolstadt tied the game early in the third when Shayne Toporowski deflected Sean Tallaire’s shot from the left faceoff circle past Augsburg’s Magnus Eriksson on the powerplay. Ronny Arendt put the Panther back up, 2-1, knocking home another rebound. A late penalty call on Christian Lukes gave Ingolstadt a chance for the late equalizer, though. And they cashed in. Defenseman Steve Lingren skated into the zone, drove to the net and backhanded the puck past Augsburg’s Magnus Eriksson to tie the game at 2-2 with less than a minute to go in the game.