A perfect performance in Prague
The score doesn’t begin to tell the tale of this scintillating Canada-Czech semifinal
If you didn’t bother to get up for Canada’s performance at the World Hockey Championships and saw only the score and the highlights, you might have taken away the impression this was just another standard, hard-checking hockey game you might see in the NHL. No chance. This was a showcase of the tremendous entertainment this sport can provide when it’s played the way it has been by the Canadians in particular in this tournament, but also by the home-standing Czech Republic squad in this semifinal that saw Canada advance to Sunday morning’s final against Russia with a 2-0 win.
Both goaltenders — Mike Smith for Canada and Ondrej Pavelec of the host team — were rightfully selected the players of the game as they somehow stopped shot after shot to give the final score the look it had, the mighty Canadian offence held to just two goals which was surely a tour de force for the Czechs.
Smith became the first Canadian goaltender to shut out the Czechs at the world championships since Roy Edwards turned the trick back in 1958. There is absolutely no question he was full value for stretching his scoreless streak in the tournament now to 137 minutes.
But he and the Canadian team received a huge break that would have given the Czechs a lot of life when they had what appeared to be a perfectly legitimate goal called back late in the second period when Petr Koukal was ruled by the officials to have been in the crease at the time of a goal. The call was not reviewable, and but if it had been, the goal would surely have stood because the poor fellow scarcely had a toe in the blue paint and did not touch Smith in any way.
If Smith was good, Pavelec was even better as he was bombarded by an absurd number of Grade A Canadian scoring chances that abated only when the winners backed off on the attack to sit on their lead, a move which didn’t seem very smart at the time but paid off because Smith was a wall in goal.
Pavelec was beaten in the first period on a great three-way passing play when Sidney Crosby brilliantly put the puck on the stick of Jordan Eberle to break in two-on-one with Taylor Hall who finished the play for his seventh goal of the tournament and sixth in his last five games.
Pavelec wasn’t great on Jason Spezza’s goal between his legs early in the second period, but he made numerous glorious saves and also got some help from two crossbars hit by Hall and Cody Eakin in the first period and then a post by Tyler Ennis early in the second.
The pride of Smithers, Dan Hamhuis of the Canucks, was outstanding in this game paired with Canada’s top D in the tournament, Brent Burns. Not only did Hamhuis make the play to put Spezza in for the insurance goal Canada really needed, he and Burns were out against the top Czech line and they totally shut down the living legend Jaromir Jagr, who is playing the final international tournament of his long and illustrious career.
The refreshing Canadian strength in this tournament has been the fact they have limited their penalties to just 20 in nine tournament games to date which has had three tremendous lifts to their game. It is leaving them more time to go to the offence with the glorious crew of forwards they have, it’s reduced enormously the pressure on what appears to be an exploitable back end and thus also reduced the number of truly outstanding scoring chances they are facing. And given the uneven nature of the officiating in the game anywhere these days, that clean record is nothing short of saintly behaviour on the part of the Canadians who in Europe are usually cast in the role of villainous goons for no other reason than historical tradition.
To be fair to the back end, they have contributed an awesome offensive push from the back, particularly Victoria’s Tyson Barrie who has tossed in five power-play goals in the tournament and 19-year-old Aaron Ekblad who has added four goals of his own, becoming the youngest D ever to have scored for the country in a world championships.
The last time Canada played for gold in Prague they came away with the big prize in 2004, but no matter what happens in the final, this has already been a great showing for this country given that the last four years it has bowed out in the quarter-finals.