Goals galore as Czechs take bronze

Petr Prucha and Tomas Plekanec both scored two goals to help the reigning champions outscore their opponent. Russia enjoyed some strong spells in the first half of the game, but their performance faded in the latter stages and a strong squad led by Alex Ovechkin returns home empty-handed.

"I think (Alex) Ovechkin is a great player and I really appreciate him as a player and also as a person. He had a very tough ending of the season, had some injuries, but still came to play to help his homeland. Everyone should appreciate that," said Patrik Elias, paying a tribute to the Russian forward.

Offense played a dominant role in the early stages. Roman Cervenka’s pass was deflected into the Russian goal by Fedor Tyutin for a 1-0 goal, but Russia overturned the deficit midway through the opening period thanks to fierce shots from the right wing by Ilya Kovalchuk and Dmitri Kulikov. Both pucks found its way past Ondrej Pavelec in the Czech goal.

Just 42 seconds later, Petr Prucha finished a swift Czech breakaway to equalize, but there was more to come from Ilya Kovalchuk. The Russian forward tapped in Radulov’s shot deflected off the back boards at 18:53 to send his team back in the lead.

"First period was very crazy," said Czech goalkeeper Ondrej Pavelec. "There were many mistakes in this game. That's why so many goals were scored. After that we improved our play and beat Russians for the third time in the last three weeks. It is a great achievement for us."

However, just two minutes into the second period, it was once again Petr Prucha on a breakaway, this time opting for a shot and finding the top left corner behind Konstantin Barulin to make it 3-3. Russian defense did not have their best day. In the middle of the game, Roman Cervenka chased a long pass forward, moved around Barulin and scored into the empty net.

At 35:10, Cervenka was claiming a hat-trick after his deflection of Tomas Plekanec’s shot found the net again. Czechs opened a two goal gap, but just one minute later, a rising Russian star Vladimir Tarasenko scored from close range under the crossbar and clawed one goal back. His effort had to be reviewed, as the puck rebounded quickly back into the play, but the goal stood.

The goal scoring festival then took a longer break and was replaced by penalties in this traditionally emotional clash. Afinogenov and Elias were on a verge of a true fight, but were quickly separated and served only minor penalties.

At the moment when Russians tried to apply some pressure early in the third period, Czechs converted another breakaway, this time thanks to Jan Marek, who fired a slapshot from the slot between Barulin’s pads. Marek, Cervenka and Prucha’s performances were criticized during the tournament, but all three forwards ended the tournament on a high.

Russia then never really looked like coming back into the game and when Ondrej Pavelec stopped a close range shot by Alexei Morozov, time was running out for Vyacheslav Bykov and his team. "It wasn't a lucky tournament for us. We did not win the medal despite having our best players available in the roster," said the head coach.

With two minutes to go, Barulin was pulled out of his goal for a sixth skater, but shortly afterwards, Tomas Plekanec found the empty net with his second goal of the game and put a stamp on Czech victory in the clash of last year’s finalists."

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