Vladislav Namestnikov, Nikita Kucherov, Evgeny Kuznetsov and Blues star Vladimir Tarasenko scored on consecutive shots and Sergei Bobrovsky made 42 saves as Russian Federation beat Team North America 4-3 in a fast-paced, end-to-end game Monday night at the World Cup of Hockey. Team North America entered the third period up 4-0.
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Captain Connor McDavid said North America paid the price for slowing down in the second period.
But there’s no doubt having Jack Eichel or Johnny Gaudreau or Dylan Larkin or Vincent Trocheck or defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere or this year’s No. 1 pick, Auston Matthews, any one of them, would have made Team USA better.
SWEDISH D-LIGHT: The all-world blue line led by Erik Karlsson, Victor Hedman, Anton Stralman and Oliver Ekman-Larsson has been as good as advertised for Sweden, which has allowed one goal in two games.
“We knew if we gave them space they were going to use their speed”. They chased Team North America goalie Matt Murray with a four-goal barrage in just over six minutes to take a 4-1 lead. Morgan Rielly scored to cut the deficit to two goals at the end of the second period and the third was all about the young guns.
It wasn’t the result North America wanted, but a furious third-period comeback showed that it didn’t lose confidence. Albert Pujols also reached base three times by going 2-for-3 at the plate with an RBI single, a walk and a run scored.
The game got flipped on its head over a five-plus minute span midway through the second period. The period in general was a more desperate affair for Russian Federation as they attempted to try and get anything in on Markstrom. They started getting some puck control and all of the sudden, the North American players were scrambling. McDavid hacked at the rebound and Rinne backed the puck into the net with his skate. Even so, it was not like North America was hurting for offence. Puck landed on Nikita Kucherov’s stick and he put the puck past Murray for the lead. Within a few minutes, Kuznetsov’s goal flying down the right wing and Tarasenko’s from the left faceoff circle made it 4-1 and ended Murray’s night.
Vladislav Namestnikov and Nikita Kucherov scored 50 seconds apart for Russian Federation after Matthews put the North America young guns ahead in the first period. Murray faced 19 shots on the night.
Ekblad has left the team and will not return for the rest of the tournament, so North America goes into its final round-robin game against unbeaten Sweden on Wednesday without its best defenseman.
The North Americans put the pressure on in the final two minutes with the goalie pulled, and got one last chance to tie things up with a late man advantage. Ekblad was replaced by Jake Trouba. If that is the case, he may miss Thursday’s game as well. That he didn’t come out for extra evaluation is yet another example of the flaws in the NHL’s concussion protocol, which is pretty scary. Sweden players said they knew they had to reach overtime to get into the semifinals.
Goaltending can be the single biggest difference for a team in these short tournaments and was it ever for Russia Monday night. Moving forward, that will give him some extra confidence.
MacKinnon provided one last highlight with the overtime victor. The bad start set the tone for a awful year.
Team North America has been an unparalleled joy to watch the entire tournament.
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The two points assures North America (2-1-0) is still alive in the eight-team tournament, but Russian Federation holds the tiebreaker in Group B and can eliminate the under-24 squad and take a spot in the semifinals if it beats Finland (0-2-0) on Thursday. “We played a solid second and our penalty-kill guys, (Ivan) Telegin, blocked the shots”.
