Sweden, Denmark skate to victories

Host Denmark upset Finland 3-2 Wednesday as defending champion Sweden stayed perfect at the ice hockey world championship, shutting out Austria 7-0 for its fourth straight victory.

Olympic runner-up Germany rebounded from three straight losses to hand newcomer South Korea a 6-1 defeat.

Switzerland recovered from a loss to the Czech Republic with a 5-2 victory over Belarus.

Forward Rickard Rakell scored twice and added an assist for Sweden to share the scoring lead with Finland forward Sebastian Aho. They have both scored five in four games.

Mattias Janmark had a goal and two assists, Adrian Kempe and Mika Zibanejad had a goal and an assist, and Gustav Nyquist and Magnus Paajarvi also scored.

Sweden leads Group A in Copenhagen with 12 points. Switzerland and Russia have nine while Austria is at one.

Denmark neutralized the Finnish firepower that scored 23 goals in the previous three games for its victory, the second against Finland at the world championship.

“They played really well,” Aho said. “We had enough scoring chances to win this game but they had great goaltending and the way they played was hard for us to beat today.” Finland outshot Denmark 35-17. After a goalless opening period, Frans Nielsen broke the deadlock, giving the hosts the lead in Herning 2:28 into the second. Aho answered two minutes later but Oliver Bjorkstrand restored the surprise lead again. Captain Mikael Granlund equalized for Finland in the third but Nichlas Hardt scored the winner with 1:59 left.