2025 World Juniors Notebook: Czechia eliminates Canada in heartbreaking fashion again
OTTAWA, Ontario – As we bid farewell to the round-robin portion of the event and enter into the medal rounds, the stakes could not be higher for some nations.
Thursday's matchups began with Germany and Kazakhstan fighting for a spot in the 2026 event in Minnesota. Meanwhile, the quarterfinals began with some easier-to-predict affairs with Sweden and Latvia taking centre stage at TD Place and the USA-Switzerland meeting at the Canadian Tire Centre.
Finland and Slovakia wrapped up the action at TD Place while the final match of the evening was also the most-anticipated with Canada looking to avoid a second-straight quarterfinal departure.
Germany wins close relegation game over Kazakhstan
With a spot in the 2026 event up for grabs, Germany and Kazakhstan took in the opening match and did not disappoint the fans in attendance. The Kazahks opened the scoring and briefly held a 3-1 lead. Unfortunately, that was all the firepower they could muster.
The German squad picked away at them and eventually tallied the game-winner early in the final frame.
Kazakstan heads down while Denmark will replace them next year.
Latvia refuses to go down without a fight
These darn Latvians. They simply refused to be an easy out for any team at this tournament. They were not satisfied with winning two games in the round-robin portion of the event for the first time in history. They wanted to upset the undefeated Swedes and punch their ticket to their first-ever semi-final.
Sweden dominated the first frame on the shot clock and opened with a 3-0 lead. But then Washington Capitals draft pick, Eriks Mateiko (Washington Capitals) took over. The QMJHL forward scored twice in the second period to set up one spicy final frame.
Mateiko was unbelievable for Latvia. He exits the tournament with five goals in five games on top of scoring the shootout winner against the Canadians.
While weathering a barrage of shots in the final period, the Latvians were unable to generate much offense and Sweden managed to hold on for the 3-2 victory.
Once again, Linards Feldbergs was wildly impressive. The Latvian netminder faced 50 shots and turned aside 47 of them. He was serenaded by chants of “MVP! MVP!” as he was named Player of the Game as well as one of the top three players of the tournament for the Latvians.
On the other side of the ledger, Axel Sandin-Pellikka (Detroit Red Wings) picked up a primary assist to jump into the tournament-scoring lead with nine points in five games. The all-time single tournament record for defenders is 14 set by fellow Swede, Peter Andersson 40 years ago.
BC line shines as USA eliminates Switzerland
Thanks to a decisive victory against the Canadians on New Year's Eve, USA was treated to the much easier path to the gold medal game.
Sticking with a method they've used in the past, the coaching staff opted to start backup netminder Hampton Slukynsky (Los Angeles Kings) to rest starter Trey Augustine (Detroit Red Wings) for the semifinals.
This game wasn't close. After having a couple of quiet games to end the preliminary round, the Boston College line found their offence again. James Hagens (2025 NHL Draft) and Ryan Leonard (Washington Capitals) each scored twice, and Gabe Perreault (New York Rangers) added three helpers as USA dispatched Switzerland 7-2.
“I thought we played well, had a lot of chances, and hopefully [we will] keep it going in the last couple of games,” said Perreault post-game.
“Gotta put everything out there, including my face,” Leonard added sheepishly.
Leonard took a puck to the face in this game, but he wasn't about to let a likely broken nose keep him out of the action.
“I was just glad it didn't hit my teeth,” Leonard confessed. "I was a little pissed in the moment because it never should have happened. You kind of have to do something at the end of the day to kind of get in front of the puck and it ramped up my stick and got me in a spot that was a little vulnerable. Unlucky, but that's hockey."
"[His face] doesn’t look too good, but he’s really tough. He’s getting in all these scrums, and he’s not afraid of anyone,” said Perreault with a grin as Leonard watched from behind him.
Hagens joked, "I don't know if he'll be doing any modelling acts any time soon."
With Leonard hopefully not too worse for wear, the United States will turn their attention to their semifinal match against Czechia.
Pieniniemi's status in question Finland advances to semifinals
Goaltending was the difference in this quarter-final matchup, as Finland defeated Slovakia 5-3. Alan Lendak earned the start over Samuel Urban, but was pulled from this game halfway through the first period after allowing three goals on five shots.
At the other end of the ice, it was the brilliance of Petteri Rimpinen that kept the Slovaks at bay. They outshot Finland by a wide margin in this game, especially in the second period, as the shots were 18-7.
Luka Radivojevic (2025 NHL Draft) was the victim of an ugly knee-on-knee hit from Emil Pieniniemi (Pittsburgh Penguins) in this one, which sent Slovakia to a five-minute power play halfway through the second period. Unfortunately, they only managed to strike once, as Juraj Pekarcik (St. Louis Blues) finished off the pretty passing play from the circle.
Róbert Fedor and Dalibor Dvorský (St. Louis Blues) got Slovakia to within a goal in the third period, but they weren't able to solve Rimpinen, and their tournament came to an end with a 5-3 loss. Meanwhile, Finland could be without Pieniniemi in the semifinals if he faces supplemental discipline for his hit.
Czechia ends Canada's tournament early for the second year in a row
It's not easy to be the host team of this tournament. The added pressure and local media ensure that. But it's triply so if you're in Canada. And through four games the decision-making of the coaching staff and the inability of the players to stay disciplined has dominated the storylines.
The team's decision to cancel the morning skate only fanned the flames of that discourse. Especially after they opted to cancel practice after losses to Latvia and the Americans. Instead of taking the opportunity to flesh out the new lines, Canada entered into the game having not skated since New Year's Eve.
Porter Martone (2025 NHL Draft) re-entered the lineup in favour of his Brampton Steelheads running mate, Carson Rehkopf (Seattle Kraken). And with Canada down 1-0 early, Martone made his impact, drawing the game's opening penalty after a post-whistle scrum.
Unfortunately, that power play lasted four seconds because Calum Ritchie (Colorado Avalanche) took down Vojtech Port (Anaheim Ducks) right off the ensuing faceoff.
Things could have gone from bad to worse when Cole Beaudoin (Utah Hockey Club) was ejected for kneeing Petr Sikora (Washington Capitals), but Brayden Yager (Winnipeg Jets) fed Tanner Howe (Pittsburgh Penguins) shorthanded to score a massive tying goal.
Unfortunately, Sam Dickinson (San Jose Sharks) proceeded to accidentally glove a puck into his own net to restore Czechia's one-goal lead. Eduard Sale (Seattle Kraken) scored in the final ten seconds of the first period to give Czechia a 3-1 lead.
It took a power play shakeup, one that saw Martone step onto the second unit, to get Canada back into this game. He tipped in Tanner Molendyk's (Nashville Predators) point shot to bring Canada within one goal heading into the third period.
Canada came out guns blazing in the final frame, overwhelming Czechia on the forecheck and with their pace – something that they hadn't shown a lot of in this tournament. They finally began to cycle high with the puck, instead of only cycling down low, and it made a huge difference with their shift-to-shift impact.
And they were rewarded for their efforts. Left all alone with Luca Pinelli (Columbus Blue Jackets) in front, Bradly Nadeau (Carolina Hurricanes) buried a rebound to tie the game 3-3 and send Canadian Tire Centre into a frenzy.
But for the second straight year, the Czechs ended Canada's tournament in heartbreaking fashion. After Andrew Gibson (Nashville Predators) took an ill-advised penalty with under three minutes remaining (that was reviewed for a major penalty), Adam Jecho (St. Louis Blues) scored the game-winner with less than 40 seconds to go.
So here we are again. The sad part? Last year should have been the lesson. But they took the wrong lesson from the 2024 team, blaming international inexperience as the reason the 2004-led group exited the tournament early. This year's group couldn't have been more experienced at the international level, filled with gold medallists at the U17s, U18s, and Hlinka-Gretzky Cup.
Heavily criticized roster decisions will remain at the forefront of the ‘what went wrong’ debate. We will truly never know if Beckett Sennecke (Anaheim Ducks), Zayne Parekh (Calgary Flames), Michael Misa (2025 NHL Draft), or Carter Yakemchuk (Ottawa Senators) would have made a difference.
However, they clearly had a system in mind for how they wanted this year's team to play. The baffling part was that they didn't pick players who fit that system. If the game plan was to generate offence by shooting for rebounds, why didn't Parekh make this team?
Deployment was a massive issue. Once the pretournament games ended, OHL linemates Martone and Rehkopf never played in the same game together, let alone on the same line. They didn't try to reignite the U18s chemistry Martone had with Gavin McKenna (2026 NHL Draft).
They didn't hold a single practice the day after a loss. They refused to juggle the lines until the third period tonight. To decide not to rely on proven chemistry is one thing, but to not give your players a single opportunity to practice working with new and unfamiliar linemates is quite another.
The list of problems plaguing this team feels endless. We could write an entire post-mortem on what went wrong – and we will, in the coming days. But right now, it feels like these 25 teenagers were set up to fail. They will be asked what went wrong, and they likely won't have many answers. There's only so much heat and blame they can take for what happened on the ice at this tournament.
Canada hasn't finished lower than fourth place at the World Juniors in back to back years in almost four decades. But they're at a crossroads now.
As for the Czechs, they bent in the back half of this game, but they didn't break. They stayed the course as best they could, fought back, and emerged victorious. They deserve full credit for the way they played tonight. And now they're off to the semifinals for the fourth straight year.
In fact, the semifinals will be identical to last year. USA, Sweden, Finland, Czechia. There is a very good chance that both medal games could be rematches.
There's never a dull moment at this tournament, that's for sure.
Semifinals Schedule (January 4):
Sweden vs. Finland - 3:30pm ET
USA vs. Czechia - 7:30pm ET
