Today’s Remaining Schedule – Quarterfinal Round
(2) United States vs. (10) Czech Republic
12:00pm ET – USA Network (get it?) – Winner gets either (3) Canada or (11) Latvia
After taking yesterday off, the American squad is finally back in action, facing the Czechs in the quarterfinals. Jonathan Quick will get the start in net for the US, while the Czech Republic will likely go with Ondrej Pavelec in net.
The US team will need to get off to a quick start, having not played since Sunday, while the Czechs and Pavelec will need to find some extra energy on the second half of a back-to-back. For now, we’ll just finish up with
USA! USA! USA!
(3) Canada vs. (11) Latvia
12:00pm ET – MSNBC – Winner gets (2) USA or (10) Czech Republic
After a stunning win over the Swiss yesterday, Ted Nolan and Zemgus Girgensons will attempt to pull off the nearly impossible feat of taking down Canada. Granted, the Canadians haven’t had the most stellar tournament thus far, but they’ve taken care of business when they needed to, and come on – they’re Canada for crying out loud. We’ll be cheering for Latvia as loud as anyone, but their enjoyable ride almost certainly ends here.
Today’s Results
(4) Finland defeats (5) Russia 3-1
In a somewhat shocking result, the Russian hockey team will go home without even a chance at earning a medal thanks to their 3-1 loss today at the hands of Finland. The Russians scored early, but allowed the next three goals, and couldn’t mount a comeback despite a furious third period effort. Finland played this one cool as a cucumber, and never looked rattled, even while the entire partisan crowd was rowdy as all get-out. Finland will go on to face Sweden in the semifinals.
(1) Sweden dominates (9) Slovenia 5-0
Sweden asserted themselves as the #1 seed today in a rout of Slovenia. The underdogs simply didn’t have any kind of firepower to get past Henrik Lundqvist, and with only one NHL players on their roster (Anze Kopitar) they never really stood much of a chance to get out of the quarterfinals. Still, it was a nice run for Slovenia, while Sweden will go on to play Finland on Friday.