The biggest opening day fiasco wasn’t the Lions’ loss — it was Canada’s

Connor Bedard and Canada lost their World Cup opener to the Czech Republic. ZUMAWIRE / MVPHOTOS

The biggest surprise on the opening day of the under-20 hockey World Cup tournament was not Finland’s overtime loss to Switzerland. No, even if the domestic media was raving about the fiasco and disaster.

By far the biggest surprise of the opening day was the loss of host Canada to the Czech Republic.

And how did the defeat come about? The Czech Republic was already leading 5–2 before the middle of the match. And with those numbers, the game in Halifax also ended on Tuesday morning Finnish time.

Canada pressed wildly in the second half of the match. However, the Czech theme was tolerance. The team withstood Canada’s huge rush and physical play, the pressure from the Canadian crowd and the difficulty of the lead situation.

Goalkeeper Tomas Suchanek was excellent. At the end of the second set, the man was so exhausted that he took a long breath of oxygen with his goal before he could move to the locker room. The youngster had 36 saves.

Canada’s letter, on the other hand, was a bit crowded. The prodigy Connor Bedard hustled and tried, but too often forgot to lend the puck to his teammates.

You rarely win World Cup games by trying alone. The team game was lacking, even though the team has eight players from August’s world champion team.

Canada also took a few unnecessary hits and blamed them on the referees, including head coach Dennis Williams.

Kari Jalonen has brought a lot of new things to Czech hockey. It is also reflected in the game of the under-20 team.

The Junior WC tournament is well underway and it showed its charm right from the opening day. The games are colorful and surprises happen.

Despite the Boxing Day results, nothing has changed in the big picture of the tournament.

Maple leaf shirts are still the biggest champion favorite. Finland still has a chance to succeed. But Slovakia will have to fall on Tuesday.