Kukla's Korner Hockey

Kukla's Korner Hockey

Videos- Team Canada Loses In OT, Team USA Advances To The Semi-Finals In WJC Action

01/03/2019 at 8:39am EST

from Frank Seravalli of TSN,

Mikey DiPietro’s eyes were as big as saucers. The only thing keeping his jaw from hitting the blue paint in front of him was his chin strap.

Minutes earlier, the raucous 18,000 rocking the red rose to their feet and chanted “Di-Pi-etro” in unison after a string of saves appeared to lift Team Canada to the semifinal. Tears were running down his mom’s face in the stands.

Suddenly, those same fans were holding their hands over their faces in utter shock.

If all of Canada remembers Jordan Eberle’s goal with 5.4 seconds left in 2009, the timestamp of 46.4 will be seared on this tournament’s memory.

Team Canada nursed a one-goal lead for much of the game, only for it to unravel with 46.4 seconds remaining.

“A World Junior game, it’s a fine line between winning and losing,” captain Maxime Comtois said. “We were on the bad side at the end.”

continued

VICTORIA, British ColumbiaNoah Cates (Stillwater, Minn./University of Minnesota Duluth) opened the scoring, Josh Norris (Oxford, Mich./University of Michigan) netted the eventual game winner and Sasha Chmelevski (Northville, Mich./Ottawa 67's) sealed the game with an empty-net goal as the U.S. National Junior Team beat the Czech Republic, 3-1, in its quarterfinals contest of the 2019 IIHF World Junior Championship.

"We knew if we put together a good 60 minutes of hockey that we'd be able to get the job done and our team was rewarded with a hard-fought victory here tonight," said Mike Hastings (Crookston, Minn.), head coach of the 2019 U.S. National Junior Team. "We keep saying this process is about continuing to take steps and that's the opportunity we've given ourselves. We're on to the next round and have the chance to continue writing our own history. We'll enjoy this tonight, but come tomorrow our focus turns towards the semifinal."

With the win, the U.S. (4-0-1-0/W-OTW-OTL-L) will move to Vancouver tomorrow where it will meet the winner of the Russia-Slovakia game on Friday (Jan. 4). Puck drop for that game will be 1 p.m. local time (4 p.m. ET) at Rogers Arena and be televised live on NHL Network. This is the fourth-consecutive year the U.S. advances to the semifinal round after advancing to win gold in 2017 and bronze in 2016 and 2018.

Highlights for both games can be watched below.

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Paul Kukla founded Kukla’s Korner in 2005 and the site has since become the must-read site on the ‘net for all the latest happenings around the NHL.

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