The 2012 World Junior Hockey Championship Thread

[Ravin]

Tournament kicks off today and Canada is up against Finland.


I have Russia winning this again though. Just think they are to strong to not take it away.

[wr50l]

This is really more of a post for myself so I don't need to go looking for the schedule all the time.

Mon., Dec. 26
Canada vs. Finland 3:30 p.m.
USA vs. Denmark 8 p.m.

Tues., Dec. 27
Denmark vs. Czech Republic 8 p.m.

Wed., Dec. 28
Finland vs. USA 3:30 p.m.
Czech Republic vs. Canada 8 p.m.

Thurs., Dec. 29
Canada vs. Denmark 8 p.m.

Fri., Dec. 30
Czech Republic vs. USA 3:30 p.m.
Finland vs. Denmark 8 p.m.

Sat., Dec. 31
USA vs. Canada 8 p.m.

Mon., Jan. 2
Quarterfinal #1 5:00 p.m.
Quarterfinal #2 9:00 p.m.

Tue., Jan. 3
Semifinal #1 5:00 p.m.
Semifinal #2* 9:00 p.m.

Thur., Jan. 5
Bronze-Medal Game 3:30 p.m.
Gold-Medal Game 8:00 p.m.

[wr50l]

I'm following the USA this year, just for JT Miller.

[Ravin]

Czech game tonight. Should be another Canada win. Basically for Canada in this tournament it is all just about positioning in the quarter finals. The USA/Canada game sould determine who gets the bye to the semi's. That bye this year will be big, because with the other side having Sweden and Russia, I don't want to be playing wither of them in a quarter final match up.

[leaffan]

USA:

[Ravin]

Czech goalie was amazing last night. You knew he didn't have the team in front of him to keep it up all night, but that first period and a half he was amazing. Then the wheels came off.

I also really hope Wedgewood stays in net as I don't trust Visitin at all in goal. Wedgewood plays for Plymouth who is one of the best teams in the OHL and he is a big reason for that. Throw Visintin in against Denmark and give Wedgewood the USA. If he beats them, he plays the rest of the tournament.

[Ravin]

They brought up a good point about the relegation rounds in this thing. For those of you who don't know, there are four divisions (Championship, I, II & III), In every division 2 teams go up and 2 go down except for obvious top and bottom.

Next year Germany and France will move up to play with Canada/Russia/etc, while Japan and Great Britain move down.

Denmark last season won the right to move up to this years Championship division. Only issue is 14 players off that team no longer play for the team this year. The team that won it isn't together. So more then likely, Denmark is going back to the Division I ranks. Now the circle effect. Majority of this years Denmark team will return next year to play and probably do well and move up again. Then they will be gone. So something needs to change for these smaller groups. I almost want to see, auto 2 years up, or expand the Champions division to 6 teams, and still have two teams go down on alternating years. Though I don't know if we need 4 shitty teams in the Champions league.

[Ravin]

This Czech Republic vs USA game is fucking intense. Petr Mrazek is playing like a beast again, much like he did against Canada, and the Czeches have a chance for the upset.


Little note: 50/50 draw at this game alone was $63,000. Jesus fuck.


Edit: attendence was 14,733. Means each person would spend about $8.50 on 50/50 tickets.

[Ravin]

USA has to hope Denmark beats Finland tonight for them to even have a chance to get to the medal rounds.

Mrazek stops a penalty shot, almost scores a goal on an empty net, and giving some sick celebrations to go along with it. He's just loving it right now. Canadian fans were booing the Americans all game, cheering this guy, and this is the same goalie they booed two nights ago on a penalty shot save.

[killgod]

finland's on their fuckin heels, pray for a lil luck and the shootout cause they blew their only chance at winning in normal play.

[killgod]

ROFL at that save.

these sporadic odd angle shots and goofy goaltending might cost sweden if it keeps up.

[PEYMAN18]

Well damn.

[Ravin]

Well I said when this all started I thought the Russians were the team to beat in this because they just have so much fire power and it was only a matter of time before it all came out. When they blew the 3-0 lead vs Sweden, I could feel this match up coming and was nervous about it.

The comeback was insane though and once again just adds a great story to the Canada/Russia rivalry.

Yakupov with a bold statement on tsn. "We win. We're pretty excited," Yakupov said. "We beat Canada. Russia's better than Canada."

The other thing about Canada was it didn't have those players who were trying to make an impact on their draft status. In years before we had Tavares, Hall, and a bunch of other non-drafted players. This year the only two guys not drafted yet were Ryan Murray and Tanner Pearson who got overlooked last year in the draft. Everyone else has already been selected and all the top prospects are either under 17 or play for Russia. It isn't an excuse for not winning but rather I guess I just felt differently about this team as if they had no fire about them.

Beating up on a bunch of small teams is nothing, so Canada winning 25-6 in round robin is worthless as shit. They didn't play any real opponent in the round robin, and even the US game was meaningless. Then they played someone who had a bunch of tough games and it showed because they outplayed them hard. With a 3rd/4th place finish it means next year they could have 2-3 tough challenges in their pool which would be the best thing for them.

[killgod]

turned it off at 5-1.

lol.

Wedgewood was poor and Canada was too emotional to start that one.

[theMINI]

Finally this fucking shit is over so I can watch Sportscentre again.