CANADA POWERS BY SWEDEN

By: Derrik T. Sovak

The Ralph Engelstad Arena in Grand Forks, N.D. could have been mistaken for a home game for Canada’s World Junior Team. The sea of red and white jerseys and painted faces made for an unbalanced atmosphere on day three of the 2005 World Junior Championship.  Canada made the ‘home crowd’ happy, with an 8-1 win over Sweden.

“It was really loud in the building. It was a lot like Winnipeg, not as loud, but the emotion was there,” said Team Canada captain Michael Richards. Richards was named player of the game despite not scoring any points in the contest. “He’s been our bread and butter on the penalty kill,” said Sutter.

“You can’t control the officiating, and I didn’t want our guys to let that bring them down.[Richards] plays with discipline and a lot of heart.”

Monday’s preliminary game between Canada and Sweden got off to a chippy start. The crowd, which was in overwhelming favor of Team Canada, started their chants of “Go Canada go!” and it continued in the concourses of the Ralph Engelstad Arena in between periods.

Penalties were a big part of the game. Between the two teams, 16 penalties were handed out with Canada being called on a total of nine penalties.

Twenty-one seconds into the first period, Sweden took a two-minute penalty for high-sticking which gave Canada momentum and eventually led to a goal by Jeff Carter at 2:28.

A Canadian penalty to Danny Syvret led to a Sweden power play goal at 7:29 when Fredriksson was left open in front of Canada goaltender Jeff Glass and beat him to tie the score at 1-1.

In a physical contest, Canada kept the momentum despite being in almost constant penalty trouble. “We wanted to keep our focus up, even in penalty trouble,” said Canada head coach Brent Sutter. “We didn’t want to have a let down like we did [on Saturday].”

Carter was whistled for hooking at 13:42 of the first period. The penalties didn’t stop there. At 17:26, Team Canada’s Nigel Dawes was called for slashing and Clarke MacArthur was called at 18:39 to give Sweden the 5-on-3 man advantage.

“We had a lot of power plays, and we killed a lot,” said Colin Fraser after the game. “You don't want to give them any time; they've got a lot of skill.”

Canada didn’t abandon its offence, getting two scoring chances even when they were two men short.

Canada outshot Sweden 16-4 in the first period but the game was tied at 1.

Canada scored another early-period goal 52 seconds into the second period as MacArthur made it a 2-1 game.  Sweden took an interference penalty at the 1:32 mark. At the 3:39 mark of the second period, Nigel Dawes scored on the powerplay to give Canada a two-goal lead.

Penalties to Fraser, Patrice Bergeron and Shea Weber over a four-minute span meant Canada was two men for a three minute sequence. The Red and White specialty teams managed to kill off the two-man advantage and then Sweden’s Robert Nilsson was called for unsportsmanlike conduct (for diving) to take the burden off.

Canada pulled further away when Bergeron tallied on an assist from Brent Seabrook.

A powerplay led to Canada’s fifth goal of the game when Sidney Crosby scored his third goal of the WJC on a pass from Bergeron only ten seconds into the power play at 15:11 of the second period.

Canada continued to dominate on the shot clock, out shooting Sweden 18-4 in the middle frame.

Twenty-one seconds into the third, Crosby scored his second goal of the game.  Sweden changed goaltenders but the result was the same, as Andrew Ladd took all of 25 seconds to put Canada up 7-1.

Ryan Getzlaf scored at the 12:32 mark of the third period to increase Canada’s lead to 8-1. There was no further scoring as Canada picked up its second victory in WJC preliminary play.

“We played a consistent sixty minutes of hockey tonight,” said Sutter. “I thought we were better as a team than we were last game.”

Canada’s National Junior Team is back in action Tuesday night against Germany to continue preliminary round action at the 2005 World Junior Championship.

Game Notes