10,000 years of IIHF hockey, man.
This tournament rules.
Bronze Medal: Canada finally ends the medal drought in a 6-3 drubbing of Finland!
Now that’s a medal win.
Game Notes
- This was unfortunately once again a fantastic example of the Canadians having their opponent’s number. They crushed the Finns at every aspect of the game and even if they started giving up goals themselves, made it clear there was no wins to be had on their dime. Just a wall to wall asskicking for a Bronze.
- Zayne Parekh got into a little bit of hot water for stating that he didn’t want to be a Robot out there as he managed to be a source of joy and strength for his team…while also having a million points and breaking all sorts of records for a defenseman at this tournament. I’m gonna be as mean about this as possible, but he is absolutely right and the fact he was even in hot water about this and the marked improvement of his team by having him there (notably Parekh was not brought to the tournament last year) speaks volumes about what Team Canada actually values, and frankly if I were part of the Calgary Flames front office and anyone raised a stink I’d be personally kicking their ass around the saddledome until my Airbirds’ tread was a permanent fixture on their pants; especially if the Flames current record were something anyone could look up on the internet. Zayne, for the love of god, please ignore these people. You have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that by being your goofy self that this works. Butheyyouknowifyoufeelalittleisolatedincalgarygivedonnyacallyknowwhatimean
- Now shut people like me up by winning Gold.
Gold Medal: Sweden at long last tastes gold in 4-2 dissection of the Czechs
I get the feeling Sweden didn’t want history repeating itself in this one.
Game Notes
- The Swedes absolutely destroyed the Czechs in a true, organizational way. They made it so difficult for them to do anything at all that it felt like Czechia had been reduced to a particularly red variant of Latvia. Noteworthy is that they let their system game completely envelope the Czechs, and the Czechs just didn’t have it last night to counteract it enough even as they came back. If you wanted to break any supposed curses, this is how you do it. No drama, just asskicking. Congratulations indeed.
- Heads held high, Czechia. You’ve still got a couple years left of this crop of prospects, so a medal is still in your future. You just have to cultivate what made you impressive at this tournament and make that your brand across your federation. You’ve got the talent, now just go and implement it.
Final Tally for Bruins at the World Juniors
Will Zellers and James Hagens were, as I’m sure I’ve
made clear already, major highlights for a deeply disappointing tournament for the USA. Zellers finished his tournament with 8 points in 5 games, and Hagens with 7 points in 5 games. Both were pretty solid, definitely still prospects, but took this tournament a tad more seriously than a good number of their fellows and it showed.
Congrats to the both of them on a rock solid World Juniors. I sincerely hope both of you will be in the NHL by the time you’re ready for the Olympics.
Thank you for following along as always! I hope to see you next year, and we’ll see you next month for the Winter Olympic games!
