An honest disclaimer: I don’t know what to tell you about the Czech Republic’s chances at the Winter Games in Sochi, but I’m going to try. The Czech squad is a riddle wrapped in an enigma, and packaged around a hard candy shell. Or something like that, I think. They have young guns, they have veterans, they even have a Petr Nedved. My God, they have a Petr Nedved!
Ousted in the quarterfinals in 2010 by Finland, the Czechs kicked off their 2014 bid for Gold against an experienced Sweden squad, and fell to Henrik Lundqvist and company by a 4-2 final.
With the 25-year-0ld Jakub Kovar getting the nod over the Jets’ Ondrej Pavelec (who will start next game), Kovar’s inexperience against the experience of the Swedes undoubtedly showed, with the Blue-and-Yellow capitalizing on three of their first 10 shots of the night.
Erik Karlsson struck first, 10:07 into the game (with the extra attacker on the ice for Sweden due to a delayed penalty), and Patrik Berglund made it 2-0 just 190 seconds later. Holding a two-goal edge through the first, the Swedes’ third goal of the night came less than a minute into the middle frame, as Henrik Zetterberg made it 3-0.
Exit Kovar, enter Alexander Salak, of brief Chicago Blackhawks (er, Rockford IceHogs) fame. And with Marek Zidlicky in the box, Karlsson and the Swedes lit the lamp once more, extending their edge out to four and by all means putting the Czechs to bed.
Making a game of things with goals from Zidlicky and the 42-year-old Jaromir Jagr, the sixth of his Olympic career, a 15-shot third period from the Czech Republic brought nothin’ but frustration to the club, as Lundqvist stoned all 15 of of ‘em, finishing the night 27-of-29.
There’s no denying that the Czechs would’ve prefered to start their Olympics off with a stronger 60-minute effort and a win, but just what did we learn about the club through one game?
Well, for one, it’s tough to fault Kovar for today’s loss. The former Philadelphia draft pick gave up three goals on just ten shots in his Olympic debut, an obvious minus, but let’s take a closer look at his game as a whole. On the Swedes’ first goal (a 6-on-5), a beautiful defense-to-defense pass from Oliver Ekman-Larsson to Karlsson gave the otherworldly puck-mover a wide open look, and with Daniel Alfredsson parked perfectly in front of Kovar, it was an impossible shot to stop. Team Sweden’s second goal of the afternoon, scored by the Blues’ Berglund, started with the steady forward absolutely dancing around the Czech forwards and putting it right where Kovar wasn’t.
If there’s a goal Kovar should’ve had, it was the third, where some beautiful cycling between the Swedes line of Zetterberg and Alexander Steen and Gabriel Landeskog led to a clean look with Zetterberg with a clear lane in between the circles. Even so, with the solid-bodied Steen in Kovar’s direct field of vision, the screen was there with no resistance from the Czech defense.
In his first Winter Games, you can’t expect Kovar to steal every game, and you can’t expect him to stop everything when he’s essentially thrown to wolves with a skating and passing game as good as Sweden’s by the flat-footed defensive core in front of him. And if there’s one thing that stood out above all else for the Czech Republic today, it’s that they’re not a particularly strong skating squad.
Aside from Jakub Voracek and team captain Tomas Plekanec, it’s hard to find speed in this lineup. Veterans like Jagr, Nedved, and Patrik Elias will get by on their smarts, while defensemen like Tomas Kaberle, Michal Rozsival, and Lukas Krajicek can get absolutely hemmed in their own zone due to their lack of speed and physicality.
It was an absolute disaster against Sweden. But did you really expect anything less? I don’t think it’s hyperbole when I say that Sweden may be the class of the entire Olympics: Their defensemen are all quite mobile (and they’re all strong skaters, in fact), they play a smart game, and know where to go to strike. And tonight, it was from the point with a guy in front of the net. The Czechs looked stuck in the mud against Sweden, and the lack of team speed as a whole is tough to handle, at least in the now. But again, what did you expect from a roster that included guys like Nedved and Novotny over Radim Vrbata and Jiri Hudler?
The good news for the Czech Republic is that they’re not going against Sweden again (at least for now), and they look like clear favorites over their next two opponents, Switzerland and Latvia. While Switzerland is considered a darkhorse by many, they struggle to score goals (they put just one in the Latvian net today), while Team Latvia’s biggest offensive threat is Zemgus Girgensons.
Yeah.