2017 IIHF Worlds: Quarterfinals
The summary of the quarterfinal round of the 2017 IIHF World Championship.The 2017 IIHF World Championship is slowly entering its final stages, with the quarterfinals being played today. With the exception of defenseman Andrei Mironov, who was left out of Russia’s lineup yet again, all Avalanche players participating at this year’s tournament played in today’s elimination round.
Russia – Czech Republic 3:0 (2:0, 0:0, 1:0)
9. Orlov (Plotnikov, Antipin), 14. Kucherov (Kuznetsov, Antipin), 54. Panarin (Kucherov, Kuznetsov)
USA – Finland 0:2 (0:0, 0:1, 0:1)
22. Rantanen (Savinainen, Aho), 47. Kemppainen (Aaltonen)
Even before the start of the game, it was clear that one Avalanche player from this matchup will make it to the semifinals. JT Compher and the Americans were willing to use their momentum from an exciting win over Russia in the final game of the preliminary round, while the Finns and Mikko Rantanen wanted to prove that their disappointing play during the group stage was merely a fluke. The US had trouble offensively and although desperately trying for a goal, the Finns ultimately prevailed thanks to Rantanen’s second-period tally, which proved to be the game-winner.
Canada – Germany 2:1 (1:0, 1:0, 0:1)
18. Scheifele (O’Reilly, Marner), 39. Skinner (Matheson, Scheifele) – 54. Y. Seidenberg (Ehrhoff)
The Canadians proved their role of the game’s clear-cut favorite from the get-go, as they threw scoring chance after scoring chance at Germany’s Philipp Grubauer, but the Capitals goalie stood tall. Both Matt Duchene and Nathan MacKinnon failed to get on the score sheet despite several quality chances. Calvin Pickard got the nod on goal and the game proved to be rather tricky, as the Germans only got themselves into chances sporadically, thus proving it hard for Pickard to get into rhythm. Pickard put on a nearly-perfect performance and was only beaten by Yannic Seidenberg late in the third period.
Switzerland – Sweden 1:3 (1:1, 0:1, 0:1)
13. Haas – 5. Backstrom (Lindberg, Nylander), 34. Nylander (Ekman-Larsson), 44. Edler (J. Lundqvist)
The feisty Swiss took points from every favorite of Group A with the exception of Finns, who were the sole team to beat them. Switzerland proved to be a problem for the Swedes for more than two periods, but Sweden’s third-period goal proved too much to handle for the Swiss and secured the Swedes a matchup with archrival Finland in the next round. Both Gabriel Landeskog and Carl Soderberg were held without a point.
Michal Hezely, Slovakia, hezely@eurolanche.com
18/05/2017 - 23:30
