The KHL Western Conference semifinals saw two dramatic overtime wins for Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod and Atlant Moscow Region.
Torpedo beat Dynamo Moscow 4-3 to take a 2-1 series lead, while Atlant downed SKA St. Petersburg to register its first win of the series and peg SKA back to 2-1 in Saturday's games.
Martin Thornberg's second goal of the game, in overtime, clinched the win for a Torpedo team that didn't seem to know when it was beaten.
"It was a really tense match," said Torpedo head coach Kari Jalonen. "We managed to improve things during the course of the game, and most importantly we showed our character."
Dynamo could not convert early pressure into goals, scoring just one in the first period through Jakub Klepis. The hosts paid the price when Dmitry Makarov equalized in the second period, only for Mikhail Anisin to restore the lead.
Thornberg leveled it at 2-2 in the third before Dynamo's Konstantin Gorovikov again put his team in front, and Robert Nilson had the final say in regulation with a last-minute equalizer.
Thornberg scored on an overtime power play to give the visitors an unlikely victory and the series advantage.
Outside Moscow, an overtime winner from Janne Niskala breathed life into Atlant's series after an attritional regulation in which SKA outshot the hosts but couldn't make the advantage stick.
Fyodor Fedorov put the visitors ahead 10 minutes in, a lead they maintained for most of regulation, but Patrik Zackrisson tied it at the end of the third period to send the match into overtime, when Niskala's onetime slap shot sealed for Atlant.
Later Sunday the Eastern Conference semifinals resume as Metallurg Magnitogorsk try to recover from a 5-2 drubbing at the hands of Avangard Omsk, and Ak Bars Kazan look to get a win on the board against regular season champion Traktor Chelyabinsk.
