Month: December 2020 (Page 2 of 4)

By Lucas Aykroyd – IIHF.com

By Andrew Podnieks – IIHF.com

There were no 16 goals tonight for Canada, no tired or under-manned opponent, only a determined and persistent Slovakian team clearly bent on containing Canada’s speed come what may.

The result was a 3-1 win for Canada, good enough to keep the hosts atop Group A with a 2-0-0 record, ahead of Finland on goal differential, but it was no waltz in the park.

Despite the fine effort, the loss leaves Slovakia in third place with three points with a 1-0-1 record.

“After the game, we weren’t happy because we had so many opportunities to score the tying goal, but overall I think we did a really good job,” said Slovak forward Martin Chromiak.

The Canadians remain undefeated in U20 history against Slovakia, having won 14 of 15 games to go with a 0-0 tie at the 1999 tournament. Canada now has a day off to prepare for Switzerland on Tuesday while the Slovaks are back at it tomorrow night in a crucial game against Germany.

The goalies were the stars of this show, Devon Levi for Canada earning the win on his 19th birthday while Samuel Hlavaj was superb in the Slovak net.

“I want to say a big thank you to my teammates,” Hlavaj said. “They did a great job tonight. They blocked a lot of shots.”

It was clear early on that the Slovaks were intent on doing an effective job of keeping Canada to the outside and limiting good scoring chances in the danger areas, and although the hosts got the only goal of the first period the visitors were more than happy with their own play.

The one error came off a scramble in front. Hlavaj made two fine stops, but in the process slid out of the goal without controlling the puck. That allowed Jordan Spence the chance to snap the puck into the open cage at 4:08.

Spence is one of the team’s feel-good stories. He was a healthy scratch in the team’s first game and got into the lineup—his first in Team Canada togs—thanks to the one-game suspension to Braden Schneider.

Spence was born in Manly, Australia, and his parents, Adam and Kyoto, moved to Osaka, Japan, when their son was three. Jordan played his first hockey there for several years, and it wasn’t until he was 13 that the family moved to Cornwall, Prince Edward Island.

Despite not speaking English at first, Jordan flourished with a stick in his hand and skates under his feet. He was drafted last year 96th overall by the L.A. Kings and has played the last two seasons in the Q with the Moncton Wildcats, the most conventional part of his hockey journey to date.

“It was unfortunate for Schneider with the suspension today, but Mitch Love the assistant coach called me and said I was in, so obviously I was excited to play in my first game,” Spence enthused. “When I went out for my first shift, there was a loose puck in front of the net, and I just buried it. It was a surreal moment.”

The Slovaks were an even more determined group in the second period, choking Canadian rushes, pushing their opponents to the outside, and not giving an inch in front of Hlavaj. They had an early power play that didn’t click, but Canada had two late in the period and barely managed a shot on goal. Indeed, the finest chance of the middle 20 came with a few seconds remaining when Levi had to make a great pad save off Juraj Slafkovsky who was left alone in the slot.

Early in the third Hlavaj showed his worth again, this time robbing Connor McMichael on a clear shot from in close, frustrating the Canadians and keeping it a 1-0 game still. With seven minutes left, Hlavaj did it again to McMichael, and moments later the Slovaks drew a penalty.

But this time Levi showed his mettle, making three nice stops on the ensing power play. Moments later, captain Dylan Cozens stripped Slafkovsky of the puck inside the Canadian blue line and in one motion sent Philip Tomasino in alone. As he was chased by Samuel Knazko, Cozens roofed a shot over Hlavaj’s glove at 16:25 to give Canada a much-needed insurance goal.

That goal came in handy. At 18:36 and the net empty, Slovakia got to within one when Martin Chromiak wired a hard wrist shot past the glove of Levi.

Jack Quinn added an empty netter with 30 seconds left to end Slovak hopes.

Roni Hirvonen and his Finnish teammates fired 43 shots on goal in a 4-1 Group A win over Switzerland on Sunday at the 2021 World Juniors

By Lucas Aykroyd – IIHF.com

The U.S.’s Trevor Zegras (#9) celebrates with Alex Turcotte (#15) after scoring a first-period goal in a 26 December rout of Austria

By Lucas Aykroyd – IIHF.com

America is back. Team USA exploded for six second-period goals to pound newly promoted Austria 11-0 on Saturday night at the 2021 World Juniors in Edmonton.

The goals came fast and frequently for Canada tonight in its easy victory over under-manned Germany

By Andrew Podnieks – IIHF.com

Defending champions Canada stormed out of the gates, scoring early and often in a 16-2 victory over Germany in its first game of the 2021 World Juniors. It was the second loss in as many days for the 14-man German squad that has been hammered by positive Covid results and the ensuing quarantining of nine of its players.

Canada scored more goals than Germany had shots (15), while the winners fired 44 mostly dangerous pucks at two German goalies.

Dylan Cozens led all scorers with three goals and six points while Dawson Mercer had two and two.

“It’s the first game of the tournament, and we have to establish our good habits,” Cozens said. “We want to play the right way, so just because we’re up by a lot we’re not going to change. We want to pretend it’s a close game and keep those good habits. We weren’t too focused on the score, just playing the right way.”

Canada now owns a decisive 15-0-0 record over Germany in World Junior history, with a goal advantage of 91-21 all-time.

“It’s not about the score,” coach Andre Tourigny reiterated. “It’s about our play to move forward in the tournament. We have no time to waste. The thing I liked the most about our game tonight was our third period because that’s the period we were the best at doing the little things, all the stuff you need to do to win, winning faceoffs, battles in front of the next, that sort of thing.”

Tonight, the short-handed Germans had no chance against a Canadian squad wearing their Summit Series-inspired sweaters and chomping at the bit to get started.

“It’s obviously very disappointing,” said Samuel Dube. “But all we can do now is focus on the next two games and winning those two.”

“We were tired, but we’re not looking for excuses,” added John Peterka. “We knew we were short-handed, but in the end we have to skate and battle hard. We didn’t do that.”

The Germans now have a day off before two critical games against Slovakia on Monday and Switzerland on Wednesday, games that almost certainly will decide who advances to the quarter-finals. Canada is right back at it, facing Slovakia tomorrow afternoon.

“You have to give a lot of credit to the Germans,” Tourigny added. “They’ve had sickness on their team, playing two games in 24 hours against two really good countries. They fought hard, especially in the first period.”

While Devon Levi had a solid two periods in goal for Canada, Germany was also undone by some weak goaltending from Arno Tiefensee, who also played 24 hours ago. He should have had the first goal, just 1:51 in the game, which came off a short-side shot from Kaiden Guhle.

Moments later, Levi made his finest stop of the opening 20 minutes, a desperate left pad save while on his stomach as Tim Stutzle tried to slide the puck around on a nifty deke.

Canada made it 2-0 at 7:27 when Tiefensee mishandled the puck behind his net on a Germany power play. Dawson Mercer stripped him of the puck and wrapped it in the vacated cage.

Canada’s Braden Schneider took a senseless penalty for a direct hit to the head of Jan-Luca Schumacher. After gaining his composure, Schumacher was able to leave the ice without help, but Schneider was given a five-minute major and game misconduct. Late in that lengthy power play the Germans cashed in. Florian Elias made a brilliant pass to John Peterka, unguarded in the slot, and he whistled a shot over the shoulder of Levi, who had dropped to his knees.

Philip Tomasino got that one back for Canada. After skating patiently down the right side, he wired a low shot to the short side as Tiefensee moved off his post. But the backbreaker came as time expired. Germany was short-handed thanks to a penalty for too many men, and after Tiefensee failed to control a routine shot Peyton Krebs jammed the puck over the goal line.

Although video review seemed to show time had expired before the puck crossed the line, the referees indicated otherwise. That goal made it 4-1, and took the wind out of the German sails.

Coach Tobias Abstreiter put Jonas Gahr in to start the second period in place of Tiefensee, but things went from bad to worse as Canada racked up seven goals, the last of which, as in the first period, came in the dying seconds and was confirmed by video review. In this case, the goal, by Krebs again, was the result of a quick shot that went in and out too quickly for the officials to see during game action.

Alex Newhook scored twice in the second, and in addition to Krebs, Tomasino and Mercer also scored their second of the night. The seven in the second tied a team record.

Tourigny took advantage of the blowout to give his other goalie some playing time, and so Dylan Garand stepped into the blue ice only to stand idle most of the final 20 minutes. He stopped four of five shots he faced.

Just 37 seconds into the third, Cozens scored his second of the night, on the power play, and the 12-1 score just made things worse. He scored again soon after to complete the hat trick, the first of this year’s tournament.

Florian Elias scored for Germany on the power play with 18.3 seconds left to finish the scoring.

Emil Heineman scores a short-handed goal midway through the second period to give the Swedes a 3-1 lead

By Andrew Podnieks – IIHF.com

Sweden broke open a 1-1 game with a dominating second period which included the only three goals of the middle 20 minutes, skating to an impressive 7-1 win over the Czech Republic.

It was the first game for both Group B teams and extended Sweden’s remarkable streak of wins in the preliminary round to 53, dating back some 14 years.

The last time the Czech U20 team beat Sweden was nearly two decades ago, December 31, 2002, after which followed a streak of now 12 Sweden wins.

The Czechs have a little more than 24 hours to recover before playing Russia tomorrow night, while the Swedes have a day off before facing Austria on Monday afternoon.

The Czechs gave Sweden all it could handle in the first, going end to end with the favourites and opening the scoring on a power play at 10:14. The goal came courtesy of a nice three-way passing play between Michal Teply, along the left-wing boards, Jaromir Pytlik, stationed to the side of the goal, and the scorer, Jan Mysak, who snapped the pass from the back-door side to beat Hugo Alnefelt cleanly.

The ink was barely dry on the recording of that goal when Arvid Costmar had a clean break, but he was stoned by Nick Malik in the Czech goal. On the same sequence, though, defenceman Victor Soderstom made a brilliant pass from the point to Costmar, driving to the net, and Costmar tipped the puck deftly past Malik just 32 seconds after Mysak’s goal, tying the game at one.

Teply thought he had given his team a lead a few minutes later when his quick shot from in close was headed inside the short-side post, but Alnefelt got his glove over and made a sensational save.

Or did he?

Replays looked like the goalie might have made the save with his glove behind the red line, but video review failed to provide an angle to substantiate that theory, and the call on the ice stood—no goal…great save.

Special teams played an important role as the game changed in the second. The Swedes went ahead 2-1 on the power play when Malik overplayed Simon Holmstrom’s shot from the slot. The puck went wide and came out the other side where Albin Sundsvik tucked it in before the goalie could get over.

Less than three minutes later, they extended their lead on a short-handed goal. A clearing puck bounced over the stick of Czech defenceman Martin Has pinching at the Swedes’ blue line, and Emil Heineman scooped up the puck and dashed the length of the ice, beating Malik with a shot between the pads.

And then Sweden made it 4-1 at 16:05 on a similar play to Sundvik’s goal. This time it was a wide shot by Philip Broberg that bounced out the other side to Theodor Niederbach, who again had the open net after Malik overplayed the original shot. It was the third assist of the period for Broberg, who is playing in his third World Juniors and was drafted 8th overall by Edmonton in 2019.

By the third period the Czechs had nothing in the tank, and the Swedes were overpowering. Elmer Soderblom made it 5-1 early in the third with highlight-reel hands on the power play. He got the puck at the top of the crease and puck it between his legs, along with his stick, and scored off the far post.

They made it 6-1 at 12:22 thanks to a nice pass by Tobias Bjornfot as he circled the net, Oscar Bjerselius, finishing the play. Noel Gunler closed out the scoring with another power-play score at 17:37.

Russia’s Vasili Ponomaryov (#13) celebrates after scoring a first-period goal in Russia’s 5-3 win over the U.S. at the 2021 World Juniors

By Lucas Aykroyd – IIIHF.com

Finland’s Aku Raty, Mikael Pyyhtia, and Juuso Parssinen celebrate after a second-period goal in their opening 5-3 win over Germany

By Lucas Aykroyd – IIHF.com

Slovakia celebrates its goal late in the third, the only goal of the game in a 1-0 win over Switzerland

By Andrew Podnieks – IIHF.com

Goals were hard to come by in the opening game of the 2021 World Junior Championship in Edmonton, but in the end Slovakia managed to break a scoreless tie late in the third period to give it a narrow 1-0 victory over the Swiss on Christmas Day.

The lone goal came at 14:17 of the final period when Roman Faith smacked home a loose puck from the slot, beating Thibault Fatton for the victory. Fatton had made a save off a bad-angle shot from Simon Nemec, but he pushed the puck right to Faith in the process.

Slovak goalie Simon Latkoczy ensured the win soon after on a Swiss power play, making a sensational glove save to the back side off a shot by Inaki Baragano, who couldn’t believe the puck didn’t go in. The Slovaks then killed off another power play at the end, diving and blocking shots with abandon. Latkoczy stopped 28 shots for the shutout, while his counterpart, Thibault Fatton stopped all but one of the 32 he faced in his Swiss-team debut.

“I found out yesterday that I would play,” Latkoczy revealed. “It was a pretty tough game. There was that glove save [in the third period] that helped me a lot, but my teammates also blocked a lot of shots for me, so I’m happy for how we played as a team.”

“We took too many penalties in the first period,” lamented Swiss coach Marco Bayer. “We had no flow, no rhythm. We had some chances later in the game, but we have to score. We have to be better in front of their net, play tougher.”

Although no team will be demoted this year, the win goes a long way to helping Slovakia qualify for the quarter-finals on January 2. Both Group A teams now have a day off before retuning to play on 27 December, the Swiss facing Finland in the early game that day and the Slovaks taking on Canada right after.

Christmas is a day for surprises, but Slovak fans were caught off guard when Latkoczy was in the blue ice to start the game. He had no previous IIHF experience with his country while Samuel Hlavaj had been considered the number-one man thanks to having previously played at two U18 and two U20 tournaments.

Latkoczy, however, was stellar in his debut. He was fortunate early on when Raymond Fust blasted a shot off the post in the first, but moments later he stoned Attilio Biasca from the slot.

Slovakia had an impressive opening period. It produced the only three power plays, but despite some good puck movement and possession in the Swiss end the team couldn’t get the game’s first goal.

In the second the Swiss got their skates moving and were the better team, but Latkoczy was rock solid. He made a nice save off Lorenzo Canonica but saved his best for last, robbing captain Simon Knak from in close in the dying seconds to keep the game scoreless after 40 minutes. Knak led all players with eight shots of his team’s 28.

The Slovaks misfired on several good chances of their own, but given their role as underdogs they deserved credit for their play, especially team defence.

Both teams were tentative in the third, and a scoreless tie through 60 minutes seemed imminent–until Faith pounced on that loose puck.

“We had a few chances during the game, but we were waiting for the bigger chances and playing good defence mostly,” Faith noted. “When I came on to the ice for that shift, I skated hard to the net hoping for the rebound, and it came to me.”

Canada celebrates a goal scored by Jamie Drysdale (6) (not pictured) against Russia during third period IIHF World Junior Hockey Championship pre-competition action on Wednesday, Dec. 23, 2020 in Edmonton

By Jim Matheson – Edmonton Journal

As a warmup for the real thing, these were two heavy hitters — far from infield practice — a ground ball to the shortstop and over to first for the easy out.

Canada vs Russia, the only exhibition before the world junior championship starts Christmas day, but maybe a prelude to a gold medal game on Jan. 5.

Truthfully, it wasn’t great theatre Wednesday because both teams also needed cans of Rustoleum on the bench along with water bottles after not playing in 10 days since the clubs entered the bubble, but it was still the two teams who met in last year’s final.

Canada won 1-0 on defenceman Jamie Drysdale’s goal early in the third but they also lost their captain Kirby Dach to a freak right hand injury a few minutes later when he went to check Russian forward Ilya Safonov in the middle of the ice and came away shaking his mitt. He appeared to have damaged his wrist.

“He’s gone for X-rays and we don’t have an update yet,” said coach Andre Tourigny, who watched as the Chicago Blackhawks forward immediately skated off the ice and down the tunnel behind the bench with 12 minutes left, leaving his linemates Dylan Cozens and Jack Quinn without their right-winger.

Playing Captain Obvious, if the hand is broken or sprained, it’s a damaging blow.

“Kirby drives the play, he tries to bring everybody into the fight,” said Tourigny. “He plays the right way, doesn’t force the game.”

But they may be forced to play without him, and they can’t just call up FedEx have have another player airlifted in to take his spot.

“I would assume the answer is no. After the teams come to the bubble you can’t add a player … if you could Germany would have brought over a lot of (new) players. My understanding is the moment you quarantine in Edmonton, you can’t bring in new players or staff,” said Tourigny, who watched the Germans shockingly have eight players test positive for Covid as they entered quarantine at their downtown hotel Dec. 13.

The Canadians are deep but Dach is an NHLer, who played about 20 minutes a game for the Hawks in the playoffs this summer. He controlled the play pretty much every shift he was on the ice. But, Tourigny has enough weapons in his gun rack to juggle. Maybe he moves Cozens to right-wing and puts Quinton Byfield in the middle.

Byfield was a force, throwing his 212-pound frame into any body he saw.

If he struggled early in camp, he’s come on and the No. 2 selection in the October draft (Los Angeles) was on the ice in the dying seconds as they held the 1-0 lead.

“Q was really dominant … when we left (camp/quarantine) Red Deer we told him we were really happy the way he was competing and paying attention to detail and how he was trying to get better every day,” said Tourigny.

“When we came to Edmonton, he kept going and he was rock-solid in every practice and got much better. I wasn’t surprised by his performance today and there’s a lot of players we could have had there in the last minute when they pulled their goalie, but there was a message there. He earned it and he’s super coachable.”

Igor Larionov’s Russian juniors won the Karjala Cup in Helsinki against senior men six weeks ago so they should have had less rust than Tourigny’s Canadian side with 15 kids who haven’t played a meaningful game since March. But Tourigny’s team was better, even if there were ebbs to go with the flow in the exhibition as Canadian goalie Devon Levi, picked by Florida Panthers about five minutes before the NHL draft ended in October, matched stops with hotshot Yaroslav Askarov, who went 11th to Nashville.

Levi robbed Russian forward Yegor Chinakov, Columbus’s surprising first-round pick in 2020, as he wheeled in alone with five minutes to play to preserve the perfect game.

“I had some butterflies but I always pictured myself playing in this tourney … and it’s a dream come true. This is still a learning experience as I try to get my feet under me,” said Levi, who doesn’t fit the stereotype of a hi-rise NHL goalie at six-feet, but stood tall against Askarov, who is two inches taller and a rare right-catching tender. Only six of the close to 90 goalies who played NHL games last season, catch right.

“The last one (Chinakov) was a partial breakaway but the read I made he was shooting … he didn’t have enough time to deke because one of our defencemen was coming at him,” said Levi.

“What can I say, he’s calm, that’s for sure … made all the saves, rock back there,” said Drysdale.

It was scoreless heading to the third, 39 shots, 39 saves.

Then, the Russians pulled Askarov as per plan and went to backup Artur Akhtyamov, the Maple Leafs’ fourth-round pick in 2020, and he gave up a seeing-eye goal by first-pairing defenceman Drysdale on the first shot he faced four minutes into the last period.

Levi only faced to 23 shots but never looked in trouble, showing why the coaching staff tabbed him as their No. 1 after camp. He stopped two shots in the last 30 seconds in traffic to leave with a big zero.

“He was very solid … he was composed and confident. I wouldn’t say he made it look easy but it didn’t make it look tougher than it was,” said Tourigny.

This ‘n that: Dylan Garand (Kamloops) was the Canadian backup and Taylor Gauthier (Prince George) didn’t dress, so he’ll be the No. 3 goalie for the tournament, playing if Levi or Garand gets hurt…Nashville first-rounder Philip Tomasino didn’t dress against the Russians. Tomasino’s sitting is testament to how insanely deep the squad is. He was fourth in OHL scoring last season with 100 points.