The preliminary series of the World Youth Championship ends for Finland on Saturday with a match against the United States.
Finland’s mood in the World Cup tournament in Canada is on the rise. In the opening game of the tournament, Nuoret Leijonat performed uncertainly and lost to Switzerland in the overtime with numbers 2–3.
In the second game, Slovakia fell 5–2. it was pleasing that Finland had five different scorers in the game.
In the third game, the team won a routine 3–0 victory over Latvia.
– The understrength and goalkeeper play were good for us, said the coach in his first under-20 World Cup tournament Tomi Lämsa After the victory over Latvia.
Looking for a group win
Konsta Kapanen has scored two complete hits in the World Championships. Pasi Mennander / Leijonat.fi
The fourth and final game of the tournament will be completely different from the others so far. On the opposite side, Leijon has the first North American team, the United States.
– We know the team. We played a practice game against them, recalls a player who plays a good tournament Konsta Kapanen.
The USA won that practice game.
KalPan Kapanen has scored 2+0 power points in the first three tournament games.
The Yankees have a lot of college players from the NCAA series.
– There are indeed skilled individuals there. They like to play a lot with the puck.
Are the Americans going to be physically tough?
– I can’t really say that. All the teams in this tournament are fighting really hard. For example, Latvia had a lot of big players. It will probably be a tough fighting game.
Second generation players
Reporting on youth competitions for NHL Network Jon Rosen brings out a few names from the USA team.
– Sean Behrens has been the best defender so far. The chain where they play Cutter Gauthier (0+4), Jimmy Snuggerud (3+0) and Logan Cooley ((1+3) is good.
– Red Savage (1+2) scored a lot of goals in the preparatory tournaments. He goes hard for the goal.
Savage is one of several second-generation hockey players on the US team. He is also an interesting name in Finnish terms.
Red’s father Brian Savage played a total of 12 seasons in the NHL, almost nine of them in the Montreal Canadiens and some as Saku Koivu’s chain mate.
New Year’s show
The start time of the USA game is interesting. It starts on New Year’s Eve at 5 pm in Moncton, i.e. at 11 pm in Finland. Many TV viewers are certainly in a festive mood and expect a good show from Finland.
– Whatever the game time, we try to make the best performance possible. Don’t think about game time or day. Of course, it would be nice to play a good game in it, 19-year-old Kapanen thinks.
With a win, Finland would secure the win in Group B.