Canada beats Russia 5-3, advances to World Cup finals

The game between Canada and Russian Federation was tight through 40 minutes, with the two teams entering the second intermission tied with two goals apiece.

“I think this is one of the greatest rivalries ever: Canada against Russia”, said Russian forward Vladimir Tarasenko. Just like how they responded quickly after trailing to USA, Brad Marchand tied the game up 72 seconds later. Prior to this best-on-best tournament, no one knew what to expect from Team Europe, but it’s evident this team has come together both on and off the ice and is motivated to reach the finals. Sidney Crosby set up a pair and scored one himself. There is respect for the competition, but Perry said he’s never played a game for his country that involved questioning whether Canada was the more talented team.

The Europeans will face Sweden on Sunday for a spot in the best-of-three finals against the victor of Saturday night’s Canada-Russia game. “But they were better than us today”.

A Sidney Crosby deke was Bobrovsky’s lone hiccup in the opening period.

“I just said ‘steady on the rudder, we’re doing things right, ‘” Babcock recalled afterward. You have to work hard and smart and play until things start to feel good. Dmitry Kulikov ended up with the puck in the left circle, but didn’t have it long because Crosby snatched it away.

Europe’s Zdeno Chara, left, tries to deflect a puck on net in front of goaltender Philipp Grubauer during practice at the World Cup of Hockey in Toronto on Friday, Sept. 23, 2016. I adjusted to that life a little bit more, but the hunger for the game and to compete is, I think, the same.

Goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 42-of-47 shots overall and nearly single-handedly kept his squad in the game at Air Canada Centre.

Playing against Russian Federation is something that Canada has a proud history of, going back to the Summit Series. “We predicted that the competition would be better than any worldwide tournament to date, that it would have a big-event feel”. But their first shot of the period came 10 minutes in on a two-on-one, and while Nikita Kucherov’s shot was attractive, a big contributing factor to that goal had to be Carey Price’s long period of inactivity.

The shots were 30-12 in favour of Canada at that point, but when Ryan Getzlaf clanged a shot off the goalpost, you wondered, if it was going to be one of those nights when nothing was going to go in, no matter how many scoring chances the Canadian squad generated.

In the dressing room after two periods, Babcock delivered a brief message. Russian teammate Vladislav Namestnikov called Datsyuk “unreal” and figures he’ll get better just from soaking in how his elder prepares for games in the gym and after practice. Corey Perry and John Tavares also scored goals for Canada.

Carey Price made 22 saves for the Canadians.

Canada fell to Russian Federation 2-0 in the quarter-final at the 2006 Olympic Games in Torino, Italy.

World juniors, National Hockey League playoffs, men’s world championships, Olympics and now World Cup: Crosby owns Ovechkin by any definition. Check back closer to puck drop for a determination of Datsyuk’s status.

While Crosby put his arm around the youngster next to him, a stone-faced Ovechkin stood with his gloves at his side. Especially crucial to slowing the Russian captain was a complete snubbing of the Russian power play, which went 0 for 3 against Canada and 0 for 11 in the tournament. Four years later, with a chance at redemption at the Winter Olympics in Russia, Ovechkin couldn’t do enough to help his team get past the quarterfinals while Crosby and the Canadians earned gold again.