The championship is interrupted for Tappara, but TPS will not give up.
TPS had something to think about on Monday night. Captain Juhani Jasu promises that the fight will continue. Tomi Natri / AOP
- Tappara won 3–1 in Tampere on Monday and took the 3–0 lead against TPS in the final series.
- The championship is interrupted for Tappara for the first time on Tuesday in Turku.
– I promise we’ll leave everything on ice. I can’t promise a result, but I promise we’ll do our best, Captain TPS Juhani Jasu says emphatically.
– We started to win four wins in this series, and it is still possible to take it.
– Let’s try to get the best out of every dude, so that in a month’s time on the summer holidays you don’t have to think about whether this or that would have been done. Whatever happens, every dude can live with what he has got out of himself and what we have put in front of the team.
Special situations
The first two finals were won by Tappara 2-1, and the same numbers were on the scoreboard again before Petteri Puhakka seals at the end of a 3-1 home win.
Tappara scored his first two goals in the second set. First, it continued its clear superiority in special situations when Veli-Matti Savinainen struck with the overwhelming goal.
The hit was already the eighth in the playoff spring for Savina, and he rose to share the top spot in the finish line at TPS. Mikael Pyyhtiän with.
Defending the playoffs with 4 + 6 = 10 leading Otto Leskinen shot the hosts on a 2–0 lead before Jack Rodewald made the only reduction target for the people of Turku at the beginning of the final batch.
– Tight defense from both teams, and a tight game as these have all been, Jasu summed up.
– Perhaps the required number of quality places was not obtained, he admitted.
Tappara’s tight five-point defense bored the blade of the TPS attack. Somewhere – above all in their game of superiority – the people of Turku have to find more power, because it is difficult to win hockey matches with one goal.
– There are no big magic tricks to do during this time. It starts with believing that we’ve been playing so far and grinding the exchange, Jasu reasoned.
One miracle
In league history, there has only been a 0-3 rise to a winning streak. The Espoo Blues did a miracle in the spring of 2012, when it hit the side in the semi-finals behind KalPan and won 4–3.
In the finals, three losses have not been promoted to the championship once.
With probabilities in this category, where does TPS dig into believing in its potential?
– It’s not worth thinking too much about the situation in the series. I think that’s the only way here, Jasu replied.
– This same game has brought us so far. However, the finals of the SM League are being played, and a few tough teams have been knocked out on the way, he recalled.
According to the familiar playoff speech, TPS will leave to play one substitution, one round and one match at a time.
– If you start thinking too much, then the human mind is such that it can easily feel too difficult and that you are more tired than you really are.
No jostling
Although the winnings are 3-0, the final series has been flat.
As a whole, the TPS of the flat field has been even slightly above the neck. This is illustrated, for example, by the goalkeepers’ defenses, which have been recorded for Tappara more in each match.
On Monday Christan Heljanko blocked 22 shots and TPS Andrei Karejev only 12.
With a little better luck, the situation in Turku would not be so awkward.
Tappara made as many as three of his first goals in the first two matches as rebounds through the legs of the TPS packs, and in the event of a tie at the end of the second final, the puck bounced in front of an empty goal. Tyler Steenbergen over the stage.
– We have tried to leave out all such thoughts, Jasu acknowledges the talks about the lucky part.
– Spring games in particular are a hell of a catch. Sometimes it bounces in the right direction and sometimes in the wrong direction, and it’s useless to stay out of it. You have to create it yourself.
Losses are not calculated
Jasu, 34, has already achieved seven Finnish Championship medals in his career, and two of them are gold. Both came in the ranks of the now-facing Tappara in 2016 and -17.
As captain, he draws on his experience as he breathes life into the young team. He points out that no losses are counted in the playoffs.
– Only profits are counted. That and living in the moment are what I have learned through experience myself.
– It’s useless to think forward or backward. Now is the place where deeds on the ground speak for themselves.