Carlson Hockey Games starts

The Carlson Hockey Games is the new name of the Czech Euro Hockey Tour tournament. The tournament is a warm up tournament for the teams before the upcoming World Championship tournament in Cologne and Paris. And for many of the players it is and important window to show that should keep their spot on the World Championship roster as more NHL players arrive to join the rosters. As usual in the Euro Hockey Tour one game is always played in another country.

This time it was Sweden who played Russia in Stockholm. Hovet was sold out (8 094 spectators) when Sweden played with a strong line up with many NHL stars. But it was Russia that started best and had a 3-1 lead when Sergei Mozyakin scored his second goal of the game halfway through the game. But Sweden came back and power play goals in the third period by John Klingberg and Linus Omark took the game to overtime. And in the overtime Colorado’s Gabriel Landeskog scored the game winner for Tre Kronor.

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In Budvar Arena in České Budějovice it was also a nice attendance with 6 205 spectators. And to delight of most of them it was the home team that won the opening game, 3-2 against Finland. But also in this game it was the guests that started best. Mika Pyöräla and Miro Aaltonen gave Finland a 2-0 lead already after 7:54. Roman Cervenka pulled one back late in the first and Jan Rutta tied the game halfway through the second period.

And in the third period Robin Hanzl pleased the home crowd by scoring the game winning goal assisted by Lukas Kaspar. In game with many shots 39-29 but goalkeepers Harri Säteri and Petr Mrazek both made a good job.

The tournament will continue on Saturday with Russia vs. Finland and Czech Republic vs. Sweden and that game can decide which team that will win the tournament. On Sunday the tournament will conclude with rivalry meeting between Sweden and Finland and the Czechs playing Russia.

If you go to our Euro Hockey Tour tournament page http://www.eurohockey.com/league/1141-euro-hockey-tour.html you could see all stats and standings from the tour. There you can that Russia is dominating the tour completely and today’s loss was their only second loss in ten games. Russia actually already won the tour before the start of this tournament. That was Russia’s seventh Euro Hockey Tour title since the tour started back in 1996. Finland has most titles with eight. On our EHT page you can also find complete box scores from all the games. You can also find interesting facts as that Finland’s 18 year old Jesse Puljujärvi is the youngest player to play in the EHT this season while Russian veteran Pavel Datsyuk is the oldest one at the age of 38.

Other interesting facts you can find there is that Sweden is the team that used most players, 60 diffrent players have dressed in the yellow and blue jersey. If you would like to find out more information like who is the tallest players and what was the biggest win, go to the EHT page and find out for yourself.

Sergei Mozyakin in a game against USA

If you dive into the statistics you can also found that Sergei Mozyakin’s two goal today took him to 28 goals in the EHT history making him one of the most succesful Euro Hockey Tour players ever with 55 points in 66 games.

The World Championships will start on May 5 and then Russia will have a change for revenge for today’s loss as they play Sweden in the opening game in Cologne. Finland plays in the opening game in Paris against Belarus. Czech Republic is also playing in the Paris group and will play Canada later the same night in their opening game.

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