It has been a busy week at the business end of the 36 match season in the women’s hockey league (SDHL).
The top three: Luleå, MODO and Linköping
Third placed Linköping’s 0-1 lost at home to Leksand leaves them with a mathematical possibility of winning - but relies on the two teams above them to lose all their remaining matches - an impossible ask given the quality of SDHL.
Second placed MODO Hockey won all three of their games this week. They lie just two points behind the leaders and have four games left to play. As long as they win at least one more match than their rivals above them the title is theirs.
But it is definitely advantage- Luleå/ MSSK. They have a two game advantage and an enormous goal difference advantage over MODO. That despite winning two out three matches this weekend. The club need just 10 points by any means in the remaining six games to guarantee the Norrbotten club their fourth regulation season championship in a row.
Relegation
At the other end of the table both SDE and Gothenburg cannot escape the relegation playoff meaning we know who will be in the playoff.
Hanna Olsson, Djurgården IF
One person however who will not be playing in the SDHL playoff is 19 year old Swedish international, Hanna Olsson. Her and club, Djurgården IF has terminated their contract early and one if the sub-clauses in the the young talent cannot play in the SDHL for the rest of the season.
The Total Points competition
Luleå’s 14-0 victory over bottom placed Gothenburg on Friday caused a stir on and off the ice. Firstly it caused the club’s top line of Karvinen, Hiirikoski and Nordin to all climb up significantly in Total Points to second, third and fourth respectively above Linköping’s Kennedy Marchment in fifth. MODO’s Michela Cava now only leads the competition by one point and risks losing the competition where she had held top spot for the last few months.
Gordie Howe hattrick
The match also saw an extremely rare event in women’s hockey - a Gordie Howe hattrick performance by Luleå’s tough back, Johanna Fällman.
As you can see in the video, Luleå’s top scorer, #33 Michelle Karvinen is knocked to the ground in front of goal and makes her way back to blue line where she receives the puck. Gothenburg captain, #20 Anna Borgfeldt, then hip checks Karvinen but falls down in the process whilst Karvinen remains on the puck. Fällman takes exception to the legal hit and comes over and cross checks Borgfeldt into the ground. The referee is all ready on hand and moves Fällman away but Borgfeldt gets up absolutely livid and comes around the referee and starts laying into Fällman. Then three or four players on each team pile in and the linesman’s come in o calm things down. Even Karvinen appears to throw a punch at Borgfeldt but Fällman and Borgfeldt receive 5 plus game which still had two minutes to play by that point.
@ABritOnThinIce1
