The Chronicle Herald (Provincial)
Dominant Canadian team moves into quarter-finals
EDMONTON — What was supposed to be the toughest test of the tournament thus far turned into another dominant performance for Canada at the world junior hockey championship.
Had it not been for the outstanding play of Finland goaltender Kari Piiroinen, Canada would have run up the score against another opponent Thursday at Rogers Place.
Despite outshooting Finland 40-19 in the contest, Canada were held to a 4-1 victory, and with it, claimed top spot in Group A of the 10-team tournament. Canada will face the Czech Republic in the quarter-finals Saturday.
“He (Piiroinen) played a very good game and it was nice to see,” said Finland head coach Antti Pennanen. “Canada were so good to start off the game and we needed our goalie to be good at that point.
“At the start of the game we weren't ready at all, Canada was so good. They played with so much speed and it was a high-demanding game for us with all the battles, and they got to all the loose pucks. We tried to improve on those things in the rest of the game and I think we did, but not enough.”
Dylan Cozens scored two goals, Dylan Holloway, and Peyton Krebs added the others for Canada, who finished the round robin with a perfect 4-0 record, outscoring its opponents 33-4 in the process. Goaltender Devon Levi made 18 saves for Canada in his fourth-consecutive start.
“It was a battle for first place, so obviously we knew it was a big game,” Cozens said. “We were real fired up to get out there and they were pretty pumped too. We're all happy with our start, I think that was our best period so far and we just have to keep building on that.”
This has always been Canada's tournament to lose and through the round-robin they never looked threatened, beating Germany (16-2), Slovakia (3-1), Switzerland (100) and Finland.
Cozens opened the scoring against the Finns 3:49 into the first period, keeping the puck on a three-on-one rush and snapping a shot past Piiroinen on the short side. The goal was Cozens' fifth of the tournament, moving him into a tie with Trevor Zegras of the United States and Tim Stuetzle of Germany for the tournament lead. Cozens would take the overall scoring lead with an empty-net goal in the third period.
Selected seventh overall by the Buffalo Sabres in the 2019 NHL draft, Cozens has six goals and 11 points in four games so far in the tournament. He wore the captaincy in place of Kirby Dach, who broke his wrist in the lone exhibition game against Russia and was ruled out for the tournament.
“I like his presence under pressure, he has a lot of composure, he competes, but he always remains calm and even-keeled,” said Canada head coach Andre Tourigny. “He has a really good presence on and off the ice and in faceoffs, and played well against their top line, generating a lot of offence as well, so it was a big game for him.”
Canada spend the rest of the first period in the Finland end, but could not extend its lead, due to the play of Piiroinen, who made 16 saves in the period. At the other end, Levi had to stop one shot.
“I know that they like to shoot the puck a lot,” Piiroinen said. “So I knew I had to be focused all the time.”
Holloway extended the lead seven minutes into the second period, as a shot from Jakob Pelletier hit him in the shin and bounced in through Piiroinen. The goal was the first of the tournament for Holloway, who was selected by the Edmonton Oilers in the first round (14th overall) of the 2020 NHL draft.
Krebs scored to make it 3-0 at 12:58 of the period when he was able to find a loose puck in front, off a shot from defenceman Bowen Byram, which was blocked. With his back to the net, Krebs swept the puck in through his legs past Piiroinen. The shots were 27-7 for Canada at that point.
“We were happy with how we were playing and we knew we needed to keep it going,” Byram said. “I thought we did a pretty good job of that and got the win and got first place. It was a pretty good night and we just have to get set for the quarter-finals.”
Finland pulled one back five minutes into the third period on the power play after Cozens was whistled for a trip 200 feet from his own net.
Brad Lambert scored on a shot from the left face-off circle, which hit the stick of Canadian defenceman Thomas Harley and redirected past Levi.
Finland pulled Piiroinen with well over two minutes to play in an effort to cut further into the lead, but Cozens went on to score into the empty net with 1:17 to play on a strong individual effort, outmuscling a pair of opponents to a loose puck and sliding it into the empty net.
“We feel good about our performance, we feel good about the way we played,” Tourigny said. “Obviously we'll have a few tweaks to our game, a few things we want to clean up, but we like the way we forechecked, we liked the way we played in the offensive zone, we liked a lot of things about our game and it was a good performance.
“Like I said to our players, we you can be happy about a performance or you can be proud of a performance, both are good, but being proud of your performance is even better and we were on the right side of that (Thursday).”