USA 3, Switzerland 1
Switzerland’s no slouch, so don’t go measuring USA’s goal difference directly to Canada’s trouncing of lightweight Norway. Bobby Ryan clearly had some familiarity shooting on his own keeper, Jonas Hiller, from Anaheim, but what’s coaching thinking by putting a top six forward on one of the lower lines? It’s either misjudging their rosters’ talent (hope not!) or trying to spread out scoring and role players across the lines. Seeing the roster construction pre-tournament, it seemed more likely that the United States would go with a true checking line to match up against the big boys, but that doesn’t look like what they’re doing now. 3-0 going into the second intermission was exactly where you wanted to see Team USA as a good indication towards the rest of the tourney, but the third period letdown took a little of the bloom off of the rose. The Americans will need to out-effort (and out-goaltend) the top three in this tournament to really make some noise; they came up short on that account in this warm-up. As a trivial point, I would have gone with Tim Thomas against the Swiss, Jonathan Quick (yes, Quick) against Norway in a can’t lose game, saving Miller for Canada only in the opening round. Miller has seemed to wear down over the last month and he could have used a week off in my estimation, at which point you could have rode him straight through the second week.
Canada 8-0
A game effort by Norway early on, but the expected pummeling later on. As previously stated, questionable roster construction–and coaching–with the immortal Patrice Bergeron lined up next to Sidney Crosby – he’s not only a fourth liner on this roster, but you could have named a dozen better Canadian forwards to the team (Martin St. Louis, Brad Richards, Jeff Carter, etc.) The good news is that the coaching staff clearly “stumbled” across the right combination by putting the hat tricking Jarome Iginla on Sid’s line. Then again, there are a lot of forwards that would look damn good lined up with Crosby. Another nitpick, a la Team USA above – Why not give your third goaltender (Marc-Andre Fleury) a go in a game that you know will be a rout? Bobby Lou is probably slated below Brodeur on the depth chart, but you could see that change if Marty doesn’t perform well against the United States.
Russia 8, Latvia 2
The other biggest mismatch of the preliminary round. Does Kovalchuk really need to dive…against Latvia? Come on, dude. We know that Russia is offensively prolofic–as Canada is as well–but what’s the two Goals Against say? Nabokov’s got to be given credit for coming back strong after a terrible first round defeat in the 2008-9 playoffs to be one of the two best goaltenders in the NHL this season – but the question still remains whether he’ll melt under the bright lights of a big tournament again. Russia’s medal hopes are closely tied to that question. And yes, those are two incredible lines…with the exception of Maxim Afinogenov.
Coming up:
Finland vs. Belarus – Belarus has key injuries at forward to Andrei Kostitsyn and Mikael Grabovski, leaving the enigmatic Sergei Kostitsyn as their main gun. Andrei Mezin is certainly capable for a non-NHL netminder. Finland will need to be tight on defense to advance far in the tournament, so the number to watch is their Goals Against. Suomi will want to see a 1 or 0 next to Belarus at the end of the game as a good indication towards possibly medaling. Finland 4, Belarus 1 is the prediction.
Czech Republic vs. Slovakia – Grudge match of the two halves of the former Czechoslovakia. Other than the outstanding goaltending of Tomas Vokoun, the surprising scoring of Tomas Plekanec, and the offensive presence of blueliner Tomas Kaberle, the rest of the bunch are question marks–in one way or another–for what some consider the 5th best squad…with former Hart trophy winner Jaromir Jagr the most interesting question mark. The Slovaks have an extremely top-heavy roster–underrated goaltender Jaroslav Halak, mammoth defenseman Zdeno Chara, snipers Marian Gaborik and Marian Hossa–so it’ll be interesting to see how their coaching staff juggles that and with what ramifications. Ziggy Palffy–remember him?–has been tearing apart the Slovakian league for three seasons now; it’ll be interesting to see how that translates. Let’s call it Slovakia 3, Czech Republic 2 in a mild upset. Slovakia goes back to back nights, meeting Russia the game after. Tough scheduling.