Favorite victories on Wednesday evening: The Adler Mannheim and the Kölner Haie each secured victories at the start of their quarter-final duels.
While the Adler clearly won the first game of their best-of-seven series against the Fischtown Pinguins Bremerhaven 5:2 (2:0, 2:1, 1:1), the main round winner from Cologne only had a wafer-thin lead in the 1:0 (1:0, 0:0, 0:0) against the Schwenninger Wild Wings.
Mannheim laid the foundation for success early on: national player Marc Michaelis gave the runners-up in the main round the lead in the third minute, and Kris Bennett increased the lead in the first third (15th).
Bremerhaven shortened the gap with a power play goal from Phillip Bruggisser (25th), but Mannheim quickly restored the old gap through Nicolas Mattinen (29th) before Luke Esposito (34th) and Yannick Proske (50th) made the decision. Rayan Bettahar (51st) shortened the score. Kevin Niedenz (13th) scored the goal of the day for Cologne in the first third.
The second games of all quarter-final series are scheduled for Friday (7.30 p.m./MagentaSport). The Pinguins prevailed in the pre-playoffs against the Nuremberg Ice Tigers and Schwenningen against the Grizzly Wolfsburgs. In the second quarter-final pairings, EHC Red Bull Munich and ERC Ingolstadt (0:1) and the Straubing Tigers and defending champions Eisbären Berlin (1:0) face each other.
