Canada beats Switzerland to reach the junior world semi-finals

EDMONTON—Whether it’s summer or winter, Canada is doing what Canada is supposed to do at the junior hockey world championship: win games, advance and play for a medal.

“The opportunity to win a medal would be incredible and obviously we are fighting for gold,” forward Logan Stankoven said. “It will be good to play in the semifinals.”

The Kamloops Blazers’ Stankoven had two goals and an assist as Canada beat Switzerland 6-3 on Wednesday night at Rogers Place to advance to Friday’s semifinal.

“That’s our goal,” Canadian captain Mason McTavish said. “Being in the semi-finals is huge for us. Let’s take it game by game. There are only six periods left, hopefully, if all goes well in the semifinals. There is still a lot of work to be done”.

On a team packed with young scoring stars, Stankoven led the way on Wednesday. He’s small, about 5-foot-8, but the Dallas Stars prospect scored 45 goals in 59 games last year and earned his spot on this team.

“(The score) is huge,” Stankoven said. “It’s harder than I thought, that’s for sure. The goals have not been easy. I have had the opportunities, but not as much as I would have liked. So tonight I was happy that I was able to create a few more chances and the puck was going into the net. So it’s a good feeling.”

Stankoven now has three goals and four assists, tied for second on the team behind McTavish, who has seven goals and seven assists.

“I thought I had a lot of jump,” McTavish said. “She was flying around. He got a breakaway, 2 against 1 in his first turn. So every time you see that, you know a guy is leaving.”

The Stankoven line also had a good night. Tyson Foerster had a goal and an assist. Kent Johnson had an assist.

Jack Thompson, Nathan Gaucher and Will Cuylle also scored for Canada.

Canada also lost a man early when Ridly Greg left the game in the first period with a shoulder injury.

“He’s being evaluated now and we’ll probably find out a lot more (today),” Canadian coach Dave Cameron said. “Any time you have a player on the team who gets injured, you know that feeling of disappointment and you feel really bad. I hate to say it, but that’s part of the game. He has probably been our best player as well.”

The Swiss, with only two NHL draft picks, kept things close, testing Canadian goalie Dylan Garand more than Finland in the final game of the preliminary round. Undrafted Attillio Biasca scored twice and captain Simon Knak, a Nashville prospect, scored the other goal.

Foerster, Thompson, Stankoven and Gaucher all scored in the first 17 minutes, chasing down Swiss goalkeeper Noah Patenaude on nine shots. But Knack and Biasca also scored in the first period and backup goalkeeper Kevin Pasche completed a solid 43 minutes.

McTavish appeared to be talking to Pasche at one point.

“I thought it was pretty good. I probably didn’t tell him that,” McTavish said. “I just get along with him.”

Cuylle and Biasca traded goals in the second as Canada led 5-3, but the Swiss proved particularly courageous, creating some dangerous moments in the third period, especially after drawing out their goalie with 3:16 to go. Stankoven’s empty net with 1:09 to go ended the suspense.

“I thought we were choppy,” Cameron said. “I didn’t think we had so much energy. I don’t think we executed fast enough. I thought we were bringing records back instead of going north. It was a dreaded quarter-final match, playing against the team that has absolutely nothing to lose, so give them credit. They came to us, and it made it interesting, but we found a way.”

On paper, it should have been a piece of cake. This was the 25th for the two countries in the junior world. Canada has won the previous 24 games, 23 of them in regulation time. Canada had outscored Switzerland 154-40 in those previous 24.

But really, you never know. That’s why they play the games. After all, it is a summer event and players are understandably out of shape mid-season, which is the norm for the tournament.

Earlier in the day, Latvia gave Sweden a scare. Sweden advanced to Friday’s semifinals with a 2-1 win over Latvia, playing a quarterfinal match for the first time in their history. It was a goal by Swedish captain Emil Andrea in the middle of the third period that won.

“It was like his own Super Bowl, his first quarterfinal in this tournament,” Andrea said. “So we knew before the match that there was going to be competition, play hard and try to win. But we got the win and went through to the semi-finals.”

Neither team was relegated this year. The same 10 teams will compete in the regularly scheduled winter version of the event, this year in Halifax and Moncton. Latvia can bring back up to 15 of their players.

“It’s a bit difficult to talk at the moment,” said Gustavs Ozolins from Latvia. “We will process it and take the positive out of this tournament. And there is a tournament in December. And we’ll try, we’ll try to make some noise there.”

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