Czechs Finish WJC Round Robin With Victory over Switzerland

The final day of round robin action at the World Juniors has begun with the Czech Republic defeating Switzerland by a score of 6-3 on Sunday.

The Czechs were rewarded after a strong start, taking seven shots in just 3:28. Their seventh opportunity was what mattered, Jakub Lauko, ranked 38th heading into the NHL Draft this year, showed off his hands with a nice backhand move, waiting until he had enough of the net to shoot at before backhanding it over Philip Wuthrich to make it 1-0.

But just 13 seconds later, the Swiss got one of their own. Ken Jager would give his country their first goal at KeyBank when his wrist shot beat out the glove-save attempt by Jakub Skarek, paralyzing the Czech netminder to make it 1-1 in a quick start to the game.

The Czechs would control much of the first period, and at 11:07 on the power play, they made the Swiss pay. Carolina Hurricanes prospect Martin Necas made it 2-1 after a scramble in front allowed the puck to find its way into the slot. Necas then spun and fired a wrist shot past Withrich's glove, giving the Czech Republic the 2-1 lead.

The second period continued to prove how wild of a game it was, something the Czechs were hoping to avoid after a 6-5 thriller against Belarus yesterday. 2:11 into the period, Kristian Reichel, son of former NHLer Robert, made it 3-1 after taking Radovan Pavlik's backhand pass in front and backhanding it himself past Wuthrich, giving the Czechs what seemed like a convincing two-goal lead, especially after the first period they had.

That was far from the truth. Nine seconds later, Dario Rohrbach took the puck after a successful faceoff win by Switzerland's fourth line and rushed into the zone, beating Skarek to make it 3-2. Then, a minute after that, Elia Riva took advantage of the extra room due to the power play, sending a hard wrist shot top corner for the 3-3 goal, a play that would end Skarek's night in favour of Josef Korenar.

The Czechs would regain their lead, however. At 28:38 on a power play of their own, Martin Kaut would get a weak one between Wuthrich's legs after taking a feed from Albert Michnac, putting the Czechs back in front. Daniel Kurovsky would add one in the third and Reichel would grab his second, with the Czech Republic finishing off the round robin with a 6-3 victory.

The Czech Republic will wait until later in the day to figure out their quarterfinal opponent, while Switzerland will meet up with Canada at 4:00 PM ET on Tuesday afternoon.

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Photo from Anders Marshall/Euro Hockey

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