The penultimate day of the 2018 World Junior Championship preliminary round is in the books. Canada wrapped part one of its tournament with a goal-filled win that should have a few guys feeling good about themselves. Here are some other thoughts and observations from Saturday’s action at the WJC.
Canada 8, Denmark 0
• Canada closed the preliminary round in about the best manner possible.
The Canucks, predictably, locked up top spot in Group A and nobody got hurt during the dismantling of Denmark. Even better, a bunch of guys punched through with their first goal of the tournament as Robert Thomas, Brett Howden (who had two), Alex Formenton and Michael McLeod all found the net.
Tyler Steenbergen is the only Canadian forward who has yet to bag himself a goal.
Canada also took just two minor penalties after discipline was once again an issue in the outdoor loss to Team USA on Friday. Now the Canadians — who have two days off to rest — must prove they can stay out of the box against stiff competition.
• As the L’s continue to pile up for the Ottawa Senators — they were thumped 5-0 by the Boston Bruins on Saturday — the focus of many fans is quickly shifting to the future. Formenton — who sniped a top-shelf breakaway beauty against Denmark — surprisingly stuck with Ottawa out of training camp after being drafted 47th overall in 2017, but the biggest riser in the Sens system is Drake Batherson.
The six-foot-two 19-year-old once again showed why he may one day be part of the solution in the nation’s capital with a nice bit of work versus Denmark. Batherson, who was passed over entirely in the 2016 draft before being selected 121st last June, scored on a deft re-direct from the lip of the crease in the third period. His acumen in that highly contested piece of real estate is why a lot of people see an increasingly bright future for him.
• Say this about the Danes; they don’t suffer from any delusions. Knowing Sunday’s night’s game versus Slovakia will determine whether they advance to the quarterfinals for the fourth consecutive year or fight to avoid relegation, Denmark dressed just five defencemen against Canada to allow some bruises to heal and its No. 1 goalie, Kasper Krog, didn’t even suit up. Olaf Eller must have gone to the Kenny Rogers school of coaching; know when the hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em.
[relatedlinks]
Finland 5, Slovakia 2
• It was a big day for Finns who belong to Canadian NHL clubs.
Aapeli Rasanen, an Edmonton Oilers six-rounder in 2016 who’s a freshman at Boston College this season, gave Finland the lead for good when he re-directed a power play pass home on the lip of the crease in the second period. Rasanen nearly bagged another in the third, but his quick shot on a rebound was turned aside by Roman Durny on one of the goalie’s best saves of the game.
Markus Nurmi was selected 10 spots after Rasanen in 2016 at 163rd overall by the Ottawa Senators. The six-foot-four 19-year-old buried Finland’s last goal of the game and also chipped in an assist. Joni Ikonen, a second-rounder of the Canadiens last June, also ended up on the scoresheet, but only because he lost an offensive zone face-off to Calgary prospect and Sarnia Sting centre Adam Ruzicka so cleanly that Ruzicka actually swiped the puck right into his own net. That tally, in the most crushing fashion possible, gave Finland a two-goal lead with a tick under six minutes to go in the third as Ikonen got credit for a goal without ever touching the puck.
• If Finland can beat the USA in any fashion tomorrow it will finish second in Group A 12 months after bottoming out and placing dead last in its group at the 2017 event. The Finns are scoring by committee in this tournament; through three games, no one player has more than two goals or three points.
Sweden 7, Switzerland 2
• The New York Rangers seemed to be taking a risk when they sent established centre Derek Stepan to the Arizona Coyotes last summer in a deal that returned the seventh overall pick in the 2017 draft.
Well, Lias Andersson is starting to make the gamble look pretty good.
Snagged with the pick New York received from Arizona, Andersson bagged a pair of goals versus Switzerland and — with four tallies in three outings — is now tied with teammate and Vancouver pick Elias Pettersson for the tournament lead.
His first goal was a sweet tip of a slap-pass on a Swedish power play in the first. Then, in the middle frame, the Swedish captain picked off a poor pass by Tobias Geisser at the offensive blueline, bolted toward goalie Matteo Ritz, fought off the checking of Davyd Barandun and buried a shot between Ritz’s legs.
Pettersson, it should be noted, scored a beauty to close out the game, dangling Simon Le Coultre and cutting across the crease to sweep the puck past Ritz. Get excited, Canucks fans.
• Don’t be fooled by the final score; the Swedes pulled away late, but this was a sloppy game that featured six —SIX! — consecutive unassisted goals. The reason for many of those no-apple tallies was terrible giveaways on both sides of the puck. And while he wasn’t in the middle of any truly egregious miscues, star defenceman Rasmus Dahlin did not have his best outing of the event.
• Obligatory streak notice; the Swedes have now won 43 straight preliminary round games dating back to 2006. The mind-bending run will be put to the test on New Year’s Eve against Russia.
Czech Republic 6, Belarus 5
• It’s not hard to see why the Rangers are excited about six-foot-two, 200-pound Filip Chytil. The 21st overall pick in the 2017 NHL Draft was a force for the Czechs and one of the few guys on the team who showed up to play in a first period that saw Belarus take a 1-0 lead.
Chytil, who was the youngest player in the NHL when he suited up for two games for the Rangers in October, made a couple nice plays on his second-period goal, initially tipping a point shot that was stopped before pivoting and drifting back from the net a little bit so he was in perfect position to one-time a pass from behind the goal line. And when a bunch of his teammates looked like they were skating in sand to start the contest, Chytil had his feet moving, specifically on a play where his hard net drive wound up creating a thunderous collision with Belarusian defenceman Dmitri Deryabin and goalie Andrei Grishchenko.
• Speaking of Filips, Filip Zadina continued to demonstrate why he’s a top-of-the-table draft prospect for 2018.
The 17-year-old buried his third goal of the tournament and showed quick hands doing it. Standing to the left of Belarusian goalie Dmitri Rodik on a second-period Czech power play, Zadina dropped down to one knee and whistled a loose puck home after it squirted in his direction from the slot.
Also impressive for the Czechs were a pair of undersized, undrafted 19-year-olds. Radovan Pavlik bagged a pair of goals, while captain Marek Zachar — who plays for the Sherbrooke Phoenix of the QMJHL — netted a breakaway goal that wound up being the game-winner in a goal-happy game.
• Full marks to winless Belarus for not going away in this game. After seeing its 2-0 second-period lead turn into a 5-2 deficit, the plucky Belarusians kept banging away.
Philadelphia fourth-rounder Maksim Sushko, the only drafted player on the club, led the way with his relentless attack. Avoiding relegation is such a tough task for the bottom-feeders in this tournament and there were a couple times in this contest where you really felt the Belarusians deserved a better fate.
