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2022 WJC: Canada Blows Out Austria

With the USA-Switzerland game in Red Deer being canceled earlier in the evening and forfeited to the Swiss (due to the Americans going into quarantine after two players tested positive for COVID), there was one game on the docket tonight at the 2022 IIHF Word Junior Championship.

This put all eyes on Canada versus Austria from Edmonton tonight.

Unfortunately for Austria, this one ended up very lopsided. Canada won 11-2 while 16-year-old Canadian phenom Connor Bedard scored four goals – nearly adding a fifth at the end of the game on the power play as well.

Kent Johnson kicked off the scoring for the Canadians on the power play. Johannes Tschurnig took a hooking penalty just 4:23 into the game. Johnson scored at 5:08 from Cole Perfetti and Johnson’s Michigan Wolverines teammate Owen Power to make it 1-0 Canada.

Lukas Cormier doubled the lead at 6:03 gone by in the first when he scored off helpers from Dylan Guenther and Ridly Greig. That made it 2-0 Canada.

About 2:20 later, with 8:22 gone by, Logan Stankoven scored to make it 3-0 Canada. Mason McTavish and Ronan Seeley had the assists on this one.

The floodgates opened even further when Bedard notched his first on the power play. At the 13:21 mark, Tobias Sablattnig was called for a hook, setting up the Canadian power play.

Bedard scored at 15:02 gone by from Jake Neighbours and Shane Wright.

Bedard was not done before the end of the first period either. Just 1:11 after his first goal, he scored again – this time at even strength – from Elliot Desnoyers and Will Cuylle.

By the first intermission, Canada had built up a 5-0 lead. They were not even remotely done there.

At 6:13 gone by in the second period, Bedard completed the natural hat trick when he scored from Desnoyers to make it 6-0. The Canadians had six goals already and half of them belonged to Connor Bedard – he was making this hockey thing look pretty easy tonight.

Then a breakthrough as Austria got on the big board. Lukas Necesany scored with 31 seconds to go in the second period after holding the Canadians to one goal in the frame. Vinzenz Rohrer had the lone assist on Necesany’s goal that made it 6-1 Canada.

But the Canadians would pour it on come the third.

It began 27 seconds in when Perfetti scored from Mavrik Bourque to make it 7-1.

At 2:34 gone, Bedard got his fourth of the night from Cuylle and Desnoyers to make it 8-1.

With 4:44 gone, McTavish scored from Guenther and Kaiden Guhle. That made it 9-1 and at this rate, Canada was scoring a goal every two minutes or so in the third period.

McTavish scored his second of the night (from Ronan Seeley and Power) at 5:31 to make it 10-1.

Bourque finished the Canadian scoring at 5:47 when he made it 11-1 off of an assist by Perfetti.

That was not the end of the scoring in the contest, though, as at 10:32, Canada’s Carson Lambos went to the box for cross checking. On the ensuing power play, Austria’s Mathias Bohm scored from Leon Wallner and David Reinbacher to make it 11-2 Canada. That goal came at 12:20, just as the man advantage was about to wear off.

Canada would end the game on the power play as Lukas Horl was nabbed for hooking at 18:13. Let the record show that Bedard nearly scored his fifth goal here.

He made a nice individual move around an Austrian defender and then hit the post before his stick failed him on the rebound and he was unable to bury that.

And with that, the final horn sounded in Edmonton and the slaughter was over. Not surprisingly, Bedard was named Canada’s player of the game.

Austrian goaltender Leon Sommer made 53 saves on 64 Canadian shots against. He faced a lot of rubber and largely held his own for most of the early part of the game.

For Canada, Brett Brochu made 20 saves on 22 Austrian shots against.

Canada is next in action tomorrow against Germany at Rogers Place while Austria will try to get back on the horse against Czechia on Thursday.

Our full schedule for tomorrow will see Finland against Czechia in Group A along with Canada-Germany. In Group B at Red Deer, Slovakia will take on Russia and, should everything be okay health-wise, the USA will face Sweden.

Also, the Devils are back in action tomorrow up in Buffalo and we will have coverage of that game for you right here.

Until then, enjoy your mid-week everyone!

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Canada Wins Gold at WHC

Today the medals were decided at the 2021 IIHF World Hockey Championship at Arena Riga in Riga, Latvia. Canada won gold in a thriller over Finland and the USA won bronze with a blowout of Germany.

The USA-Germany game started with a Jason Robertson double minor assessed 58 seconds into the game for a high stick.

The power play was killed at 4:58 and four seconds following that, Christian Wolanin scored for the Americans. He scored unassisted at 5:02 to make it 1-0 USA.

The Americans took that lead into the second when, 6:27 into the new frame, Conor Garland scored to make it 2-0. Robertson and Wolanin had the assists.

Less than two minutes after the Garland goal, the Americans tripled their lead when Jack Drury scored at 8:05 from Sasha Chmelevski.

At 8:27, 22 seconds after the goal that made it 3-0, Kevin Rooney took a tripping penalty. Just as that was killed off by the USA, Germany’s Matthias Plachta took a holding call at 10:46, putting the US on the power play.

At 11:35, Robertson notched his second point of the night when he scored from Garland and Tage Thompson to make it 4-0.

Less than 20 seconds after that goal, at 11:53, Germany’s Nicolas Krammer took a cross-checking call that put the Americans back on the power play.

Rinse, wash, repeat.

At 12:15, Trevor Moore scored the Americans second power play goal when he scored from Garland and Thompson. That made it 5-0.

The Americans lost Chmelevski at 12:31 when he got called for a five-minute major for a check to the head and neck area and a game misconduct. At 13:21, Colin Blackwell took a tripping penalty, putting the Germans up 5-on-3.

The Americans got through that trouble, but Dominik Bittner got Germany on the board 9:28 into the third. He got assists from Plachta and Dominik Kahun on the goal that made it 5-1 USA.

The USA would add one more goal at 9:53, less than thirty seconds after Germany got on the board. Ryan Donato scored from Adam Clendening and Thompson to make it 6-1.

Things got a little chippy at the end of the game. At 12:21, Germany’s Korbinian Holzer and Maximilian Kastner went off for interference and roughing, respectively. Donato joined them for a rough.

At 15:38, Markus Eisenschmid went off for slashing and roughing and the USA’s Blackwell went of for the same thing.

Finally, the US took a too many men on the ice bench minor with ten seconds remaining in regulation.

But the US survived and took the bronze. Following the game, in a show of sportsmanship, the Germans and Americans shook hands Stanley Cup Playoffs-style. It was great to see them do that with the way discipline broke down later on in the game.

Matt Tennyson played 21:35 while Matt Hellickson did not suit up for the Americans.

Congratulations to Team USA for medaling in the 2021 IIHF World Hockey Championship.

If the bronze medal game was a forgone conclusion due to its blowout nature, then the gold medal game went down to the wire.

Canada defeated Finland to take home their 27th gold medal at this tournament and become the first team to lose their first three games in the tournament and still win gold at the end.

Early on, Justin Danforth of Canada took a boarding penalty and a ten-minute misconduct meaning he would be unavailable for most of the first period. That came 4:15 into the game.

At 6:56, Nick Paul of Canada was called for a high stick to put the Finns on the power play. One second after the power play ended, Mikael Ruohomaa scored from Oliwer Kaski to make it 1-0 Finland.

Finland got into penalty troubler early in the frame when Arttu Ruotsalainen took a hooking call at 1:26 and Atte Ohtamaa took a tripping penalty to put the Canadians on the two-man advantage for about 12 seconds. It was on the Ohtamaa penalty that Canada would tie things.

Maxime Comtois scored at 4:30 from Connor Brown and Sean Walker to tie things up at one apiece.

With 4:03 to go in the second, Adam Henrique had seemingly put the Canadians ahead, but the Finns challenged for offsides. The replay was pretty conclusive that Canada was offside when they entered the zone, so the goal was overturned. It was the second straight game that Henrique had a goal overturned on him.

Finland retook the lead 5:27 into the third period when Petteri Lindbohm scored from Kim Nousiainen and Ruohomaa. It was now 2-1 Finland.

Canada’s Walker took a boarding penalty 8:38 to go in the third and was also assessed a ten-minute misconduct.

But it would be Canada that would have the last laugh on a power play. At 12:19, Ruohomaa went off for tripping. Just 18 seconds into the man advantage, Canada capitalized.

Henrique, denied a goal earlier, scored at 12:37 from Comtois and Connor Brown to tie the game at two.

When the final horn sounded and we had not settled things, it was off to a full twenty-minute three-on-three overtime.

It only took 6:26 for Canada to get things done. Nick Paul took a return pass from Brown in tight on Finnish goalie Jussi Olkinuora and put home the gold medal winning goal. Our final was 3-2 Canada.

So Canada got their revenge on Finland who defeated them in this tournament in 2019 (the World Championship was not held in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Congrats to Canada on another gold medal. We will see you next year for the 2022 IIHF World Championship in Finland.