Munich, Germany - While the Hamburg Freezers were idle, the Berlin Eisbären and Augsburger Panther remain in a two-way tie on top of the DEL table after gameday 8 in the Deutsche Eishockey Liga (DEL) Sunday. Expansion team Freiburg Wölfe recorded their second win of the season, upsetting defending champs Krefeld Pinguine.

Defenseman Rob Leask recorded a hat trick as Berlin rallied from an 2-1 second-period deficit to down the Hannover Scorpions 5-2 (1-1, 2-1, 2-0) at home. Despite out-shooting the Eisbären 36-29, Hanover could not avoid their sixth loss of the season. The Eisbären improved to 6-2 while Hanover is near the bottom of the standings with a 2-6 record. Leask opened the scoring on the power-play just 2:55 into the campaign. The Eisbären could not find their rhythm though and the Scorpions turned the momentum, taking a 2-1 lead on goals from Thomas Dolak (13:26) and Björn Bombis, who knocked home the rebound of Edvin Frylin’s shot 1:44 into the middle stanza. Veteran Len Soccio failed to double Hanover’s lead when he was denied by Eisbären goalie Rich Parent on a breakaway. It should come back to haunt the Scorps. The momentum swung again when Denis Pederson (33:33) and Mark Beaufait (33:57) tallied back-to-back goals within a 24-second span to put Berlin up 3-2 at the second intermission. Leask put the game out of reach on a solo effort 7:11 into the final period and completed his hat trick with an empty-netter 19 seconds from the final horn.

Augsburger Panther keep pace

The Augsburger Panther improved their impressive home record to 5-0 with a 3-1 (0-0, 2-0, 1-1) win over the Kassel Huskies. With an overall record of 6-2, Benoit Lapointe’s team is tied at 17 points with Pierre Pagé’s Eisbären, who have a better goal differential (+12 vs. +10). Kassel is 3-5. After a scoreless first, Duanne Moeser broke the deadlock with a power-play tally 1:41 into the second period. Francois Fortier doubled Augsburg’s lead at 11:40 of the middle frame, ripping the puck past Huskies goaltender Joaquin Gage from the slot just seconds after power-play opportunity ended. A number of penalties had the Huskies backed up in their own zone a couple of times, but Augsburg failed to cash in. Mikeal Wahlberg got Kassel on the scoreboard, wristing a shot past Panther goalie Magnus Eriksson with 6:16 left in regulation, but the Huskies failed to come back despite a late power-play opportunity. Defenseman John Miner capped the Panther win with a short-handed empty-net goal at 19:18 of the final period.

Poss returns to Iserlohn, Nürnberg moves into third place

First-year player Konstantin Firsanov scored back-to-back third period goals as the Nürnberg Ice Tigers skated past the Iserlohn Roosters 5-2 (2-1, 1-1, 2-0), to give new Tigers coach Greg Poss a victory in his first trip to his former club. Fellow youngsters Josef Menauer and Benjamin Barz also contributed two points each. At 5-3, Nürnberg is third in the league. Iserlohn dropped to 3-5. Nuremberg drew first blood on an short-handed oddman-rush. Marian Cisar sped along the right boards, faked a slapshot and sent a no-look pass across to a wide-open Steve Larouche who converted for the 1-0 lead from the left faceoff-circle 4:03 into the contest. Iserlohn battled back and tied the score at 8:46. With the teams skating four aside, James Black's nifty backhand feed from behind the net found Bryan Adams all alone in front of the net to make it 1-1. The Tigers went back ahead when defenseman Stephané Julien fired a one-timer from the center point past screened Iserlohn netminder Michael Foutain on a 5-on-3 power-play at 13:56. Youngster Barz doubled the lead to 3-1, knocking home the puck from the near left slot midway through the middle frame. A tally from defender Dave Cooper got the Roosters to within a goal 4:46 before the second intermission. But back-to-back tallies from Nuremberg’s Firsanov near the midway point of the final period killed any hope of a comeback. The 20-year-old first scored on a solo effort to make it 4-2 at 09:49 of the third. Less than three minutes later, Josef Menauer wrestled the puck free along the backboards, pulled to the front of the net and found Firsanov right on the doorstep to cap the scoring at 5-2 with 7:26 to go.

Mannheim stops Düsseldorf

Stefan Ustorf had a pair of assists as the Mannheim Adler outmuscled the Düsseldorfer EG Metro Stars on the road, 3-1 (1-1, 0-0, 2-0), ending Düsseldorf’s two-game win streak. The Metro Stars fell to 2-6 while Mannheim improved to 5-2. Skating four aside, Düsseldorf drew first blood with just under four minutes to go in the opening frame. Set up by fellow Norwegian Tore Vikingstad, winger Trond Magnussen beat Adler defender Sascha Goc 1-on-1 and slipped the puck past goalie Richard Shulmistra. Düsseldorf’s lead lasted less than a minute, though. Christoph Ullmann tied the contest at 1-1, deflecting a shot from Ustorf past Stars netminder Andrej Trefilov. Lack of discipline cost Düsseldorf the game. With Gerhard Unterluggauer and Mike Pellegrims in the sin bin, René Corbet gave the Adler a 2-1 lead 13:11 of the final period, converting a backhand shot out of traffic on a two-man advantage. Todd Hlushko sealed Mannheim’s 3-1 win with an empty-netter 10 seconds before the end of regulation.

Slumping Ingolstadt falls to the bottom, Freiburg stuns defending champs

ERC Ingolstadt ended its six-game, season-opening road trip with their fourth straight loss and slipped to the bottom of the table (1-4) while expansion team Freiburg Wölfe (2-5) edged defending champions Krefeld Pinguine (5-3) at home to record their second win of the season.

Veteran Leo Stefan scored a pair of goals, including the game-winner at 6:13 of the final period, and Sergej Stas recorded three assists as the Freiburg Wölfe rallied from a 3-1 second-period deficit to stun Krefeld 5-4 (1-1, 3-3, 1-0) at home. Pinguine forward Rob Guillet also had two tallies, both on the power-play. Down by two goals four minutes into the middle frame, the Wölfe cashed in on three straight power-play opportunities. Dany Bousquet, Vadim Slivchenko and Ravil Khaidarov tallied three unanswered power-play goals to put Freiburg up 4-3 late in the second. Guillet evened the score with 1:20 left in the period. Steffen Ziesche and Eric Betrand had first-period goals for Krefeld.

Jesse Belanger scored a hat trick as the Frankfurt Lions routed ERC Ingolstadt 5-1 (3-0, 0-1, 2-0). Pat Lebeau assisted on all three tallies. Peter Ratchuk and Dwayne Norris also scored for Frankfurt (5-3), while Doug Ast came up with Ingolstadt’s only goal on a power-play midway through the game.