Czechia has once again knocked Canada out of the World Junior Hockey Championship, winning 4-3 in the quarterfinals on Thursday. Czech forward Jakub Lauko, who plays for the Minnesota Wild, summed up the result in a one-word tweet:
"Again."
This marks the second straight year that the Czechs have eliminated Canada in the quarterfinals of the tournament. Lauko also tweeted at that time,
"Not today Canada" after Czechia beat the Canadians 3-2 in last year's quarters.
The Czechs got off to a fast start on Thursday, jumping out to a 3-1 lead in the first period on goals from Petr Sikora, Jakub Stancl and Eduard Sale. Tanner Howe scored Canada's lone goal in the opening frame.
But Team Canada battled back with two straight goals in the second period from Porter Martone and Bradly Nadeau to tie the game 3-3. In the end, it was Czech forward Adam Jecho who scored the game-winning goal for his team with just 40 seconds remaining in regulation.
On Jecho’s game winning goal, Lauko tweeted,
“Oh no you love to see it” in response to analyst Pete Blackburn's tweet.
Goaltender Michael Hrabal stopped 29 shots, while Carter George made 22 saves.
Next up for the Czechs is a semi-final match on Saturday against the United States, who secured a 7-2 win over Switzerland in the quarters.
Paul Bissonnette wants to coach Team Canada
Former NHL player turned analyst Paul Bissonnette said on the 'Spittin' Chiclets' podcast that he wants to coach Team Canada at the world championships. Bissonnette compared himself to legendary coach Herb Brooks, who led the underdog American team to a miraculous gold medal at the 1980 Olympics.
"I mean, I would love an opportunity to coach Team Canada next year," Bissonnette said. "Maybe like a Herb Brooks type of situation... I got a Wayne Gretzky blazer on...I could step behind that bench and fire those guys up."
"I’ll just do the lineup reads like I do at all the junior games, like the Oil Kings," he said. "I did a lineup read for the Oil Kings and they won a f**king championship."
In other quarterfinal rounds, Sweden won 3-2 against Latvia and Finland won 5-2 against Slovakia. Both teams are set to compete on Saturday, with the grand finale for the gold medal taking place on Sunday.