Today's the final day for the preliminary round at the World Championship.
The eight teams that will play in the quarterfinal have been set, but the last games tonight will determine the matchups and who plays where.
Canada and Finland fill face off tonight to determine which team claims first place in Group B. Both have perfect 6-0 records so far in the tournament—and Canada's World Championship winning streak is now at 16 games after rolling all the way through the 2015 tournament.
Defenseman Ryan Ellis of the Nashville Predators arrived on Sunday and was inserted into the lineup on Monday for Canada's 4-0 win against France. He was whistled for a slash that set up a French penalty shot with the score 1-0 early in the first period, but also picked up an assist on Canada's second goal, which came right at the tail end of a second-period power play. He was Team Canada's icetime leader at 21:19 and bumped Ben Hutton off the bench and into the press box.
I was thinking that was the first healthy scratch of Hutton's pro career, but it's not. He signed his pro contract in March of 2015, after his junior year at Maine concluded, and was assigned directly to the AHL. But he played only four regular-season games and didn't make a playoff appearance for the Utica Comets.
Coming off two tough seven-game playoff series with Nashville and the long travel to Russia, Ellis was pretty wiped when I spoke to him after the game.
Click here for my game story from Monday, which also featured a shutout performance from backup goaltender Calvin Pickard—who was exuberant after the game—and a goal from Corey Perry on the day of his 31st birthday.
The other big story here on Monday was the press conference for IIHF President Rene Fasel, who talked about the challenges that still surround getting NHL players to the 2018 Olympics.
The good news is that the IIHF, the NHL and the Players' Association all seem to be keen on the idea of players participating. The hurdle, now, is that the IOC has withdrawn funding for insurance and transportation that they've previously paid. That shortfall needs to be made up, somehow, to make things work.
I had heard talk, previously, that the league wanted to make a decision by the time of the September World Cup of Hockey in Toronto. Fasel says the drop-dead date could be as late as January of 2017, when the NHL starts planning its schedule for next season.
So, there's still time to sort something out. You can read more on the subject here, from Michael Traikos of the
National Post.
All we know so far about the World Championship quarterfinal is that the Czech Republic, which finished first in Group A, will face the U.S. in Moscow on Thursday. Canada and Finland will finish first and second in Group B, so whoever finishes first will face Denmark in St. Petersburg, while the second-place team gets the loser of tonight's Sweden/Russia game in Moscow. Germany finished an impressive third in Group B and will player the winner of Sweden/Russia.
Got it?
Of the seven members of the Vancouver Canucks that made the trip over to Russia, five are still alive. Yannick Weber finished the tournament with a goal and two assists and was a minus-one in seven games for Switzerland, which finished with a 1-1-3-2 record for eight points, while Ronalds Kenins had one goal, a one-game suspension, and was a minus-five for Latvia, which is losing 3-1 to Norway in its final game as I type this and was 1-0-3-2 in its earlier six games.
With Thatcher Demko of the U.S. and Canada's Ben Hutton in their teams' press boxes, that leaves Chris Tanev, Jacob Markstrom and Jannik Hansen to represent for the Canucks.
Tanev goes into Canada's final game with one assist and a plus-five—which is only kinda average on a team that has outscored its opposition 34-4 in the first six games. He's averaging 16:26 of ice time per game, and that number went down last game, when he played just 15:12 after Ellis showed up. Morgan Rielly and Ryan Murray are also now playing bigger minutes than Tanev.
Jacob Markstrom ranks seventh among primary goaltenders in the tournament with a .917 save percentage—he has appeared in four of Sweden's first six games. The Swedes have had a day off since beating Switzerland on Sunday, so I imagine they'll go back to Markstrom again tonight against Russia.
As for Jannik Hansen—the Danes have had a good tournament, reaching the quarterfinal for only the second time in history. They finished eighth in 2010.
Hansen is second in minutes for Danish forwards behind Lars Eller of the Montreal Canadiens, at 19:15 per game. He has two goals and two assists in seven games, and is a minus-two.
I'm crossing my fingers for a Canada/Denmark quarterfinal. I'd like to see Hansen, and see what Nicklas Jensen is getting up to compared to his brief stretches with the Canucks.
From the other side of the pond, the Canucks announced another player signing on Monday:
That name makes Laplante sound like some kind of awesome Swiss-Russian-French-Canadian multi-purpose Transformer of a player!
The bare bones—Laplante a 21-year-old left wing, 6'0" and 183 pounds. He was drafted in the third round by the Arizona Coyotes in 2013 but they didn't come to terms on a contract, so he went back into the draft and wasn't selected last year.
Playing as an overager in the QMJHL, Laplante collected an impressive 34 goals and 65 points to go along with his 88 penalty minutes with the Gatineau Olympiques. He's said to have good hands as well as a feisty side.
Sounds to me like he'll slot into the development chart where Drake Caggiula had been pencilled in. Always nice to see Jim and Trevor making the prospect pool deeper, but I don't think we need to spend a lot of time talking about Yan-Pavel until this summer's development camp, at the very soonest.
OK...I'd better run. Gotta get back to the arena and get ready for tonight's big game!
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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