In the World Cup final against Finland: Canada can overtake the excluded Russians

In the World Cup final against Finland
Canada can overtake expelled Russians

The United States were ice hockey’s last world champions 62 years ago – and have failed in the semi-finals for the 15th time since then. Instead, the Olympic champions qualify for the final in their own country. Canada is waiting there for the third consecutive time. With a victory, the North Americans would be the only winners of the record.

And the marmot salutes every year: the defending champions, Canada, and the Olympic champions, Finland, play in the final of an ice hockey world championship for the third consecutive time. In the semi-finals in Tampere, Canada beat Germany’s Czech Republic 6-1 (1-1, 3-0, 2-0). World Cup hosts Finland won narrowly and with great luck 4:3 (1:1, 2:1, 1:1) against USA. The final will also take place in Tampere on Sunday (7:20 p.m./Sport1 and MagentaSport). With another gold medal, Canada can become the only record world champion ahead of Russia, which was kicked out of the tournament following Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine.

After a balanced first period, Canada broke the resistance and morale of the Czechs with three goals in three minutes, who had taken the lead 1-0 (8th) thanks to David Krejci. It was to remain the only Czech goal before the Canadian goal machine kicked into gear. Dylan Cozens equalized 30 seconds before the first half break, after which Adam Lowry (28′), Kent Johnson (29′) and Matthew Barzal (31′) scored within a minute. Cole Sillinger (44th) and again Cozens (53rd) made everything perfect in the final third.

The United States, last world champions in 1960 and who have since failed 15 times in the semi-finals, got off to a good start against Finland. Just 64 seconds were played when defender Nate Schmidt made it 1-0. The Finns were only briefly shocked, in the 17th minute youngster Miro Heiskanen equalized to make it 1-1. The Finn led 2-1 by Sakari Manninen in the 17th minute and was leveled by Sean Farrell to make it 2-2 (28th), but just 120 seconds later Sami Vatanen restored the old lead (30th) .

After Joel Armia made it 4-2 (48′), the cheers in the crowded rows knew no bounds, but the USA weren’t giving up yet. Two minutes before the final siren, Adam Gaudette scored to make it 4-3, but it was too late to turn things around again.

Doran Sandoval

Lifelong zombie fan. Twitter evangelist. Unapologetic travel buff. Hipster-friendly introvert. Typical creator

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