Canada’s penalty kill breaks down
Loss to Finland drops team to fourth in group with two games left
HERNING, DENMARK— The road to the medal round got tougher for Canada on Saturday at the world hockey championship.
Mikko Rantanen scored two goals as Finland beat Canada 5-1. Rantanen and Janne Pesonen scored on the power play for the Finns, who also had goals from Eeli Tolvanen and Teuvo Teravainen.
Jean-Gabriel Pageau had the lone goal for Canada. Canada entered the game with a perfect 12-for-12 record on the penalty kill, but Pesonen and Rantanen both struck with the man advantage to give Finland a two-goal lead after one period.
“There was nothing different,” said Bo Horvat, who has been one of Canada’s key penalty killers. “I think they just moved it around pretty quick. They’ve got a lot of skilled forwards out there and they made some good plays.”
“They were able to expose some seams,” added coach Bill Peters. “They did a good job of quick puck movement and had a real good plan.”
For their part, Canada’s power play was 5-for-17 coming in but went 0-for-5 against the Finns.
“We’re going to have to make some adjustments,” said Peters. “We didn’t handle the puck pressure up top very well.”
Finland moved into second place in Group B, one point behind the United States. Canada sat fourth with10 points but has played one less game than third-place Denmark.
Two games remain for the Canadians in the round-robin portion of the tournament: Monday against Latvia and Tuesday against Germany. The top four teams from each bracket will advance to Thursday’s quarter-finals.
Finland opened the scoring at the 8:50 mark of the first period off an own goal for Canada, when Brayden Schenn acciden- tally tipped the puck between the pads of goaltender Curtis McElhinney. Rantanen was given credit. Pageau drew Canada even with his first of the tournament at 10:55 before Finland went to work with the man advantage. With Josh Bailey serving an interference penalty, Pesonen deflected a puck past McElhinney from the top of the crease at 13:48. Rantanen then outwaited McElhinney before roofing a backhander for his second of the game at 16:35 while Anthony Beauvillier was serving a tripping penalty.
“We were always behind, trying to play catch-up,” said Connor McDavid, who served a high-sticking double minor in the third period as part of Canada’s 22 total minutes in penalties. “When you’re behind people like that, you’re going to hook and hold and you’re going to take some penalties.”