All Flames prospects in action today. Lose and the tournament is over for you.
Flames prospect stats:
Fox 4gp 1g 3a 4pts +4 - tied for 11th in assists, tied for 6th points by defencemen
Valimaki 4gp 1g 3a 4pts +1 - tied for 11th in assists, tied for 6th points by defencemen
Lindstrom 4gp 0g 1a 1pts +1 - 5th in faceoff% 63.64%
Ruzicka 4gp 0g 2a 2pts +2
Dube 4gp 1g 1a 2pts +1
Tuulola 2gp 0g 0a 0pts +1
10 AM MT Czechia vs Finland
The Czechs have been a high scoring team this year, scoring 5 or more goals in 3 of their 4 preliminary games. Their weakness is goaltending and letting teams back into games after establishing a lead.
Lucky for the Fins is that they have the defense and goaltending to handle the Czechs firepower on paper and do have the offensive talent to take advantage of the Czech goaltending.
If Finland can play a good solid game and limit the Czech offense, it should be their game.
Tuulola #19 and Valimaki #6 for Finland
2 pm MT Canada vs Switzerland
Who better than the Swiss coach to setup the game:
Dube #9 for Canada
4pm MT Sweden vs Slovakia
The Swedes look strong this year. They are good in all areas: 5 on 5, defence, goaltending, PK, and PP. The Slovaks will need to play very well to have a chance.
Lindstrom #16 for Sweden and Ruzicka #21 for Slovakia
6pm MT USA vs Russia
Adam Fox was the hero against the Fins scoring the game winning goal with less than 1:37 left in the game.
I thought Czech's tying goal could have been goaltender interference for the forward taking the goaltender's stick-blade with him as he screened in front of the crease. Left the five-hole open for the shot.
Unfortunately scheduling pretty much dictates that shootouts be in play for international tournaments. They have a set number of days to get a tournament completed and limited buildings to do it in. They have to make sure they have the time to turn the buildings around for the next game (for example Canada plays 2 hours later in the same building and then the US plays about 90 minutes after the Canada game finishes).
The actual medal games I can see having just OT but before those games it is difficult if not impossible without extending the tournament (not going to happen) or putting rules in place that host nations must have more facilities available (also not going to happen).
I'd rather they just do 4-on-4 for 5 minutes, and 3-on-3 till someone scores. I doubt it would last much longer than the addition of a shootout on top of 10 minutes, and would at least be team oriented. Or if they want to be even more efficient, just start at 3-on-3.
Read elsewhere that Valimaki did not have a good game
Yeah Valimaki did not do much to impress me at this tournament. He was decent along the boards and winning puck battles but he made some bad pinches and looked slow on races to the puck. I was expecting a bit more from him but certainly not concerned.
2018 WJC Quarterfinals: CZE-FIN, CAN-SUI, SWE-SVK, USA-RUS
