WJC 2024

[kingpin794]

It’s that time of year again. Invites to camps are going to start coming in. Sapovaliv and Dionicio are locks for Czechia and Switzerland. USA released their invite list today. Oke was left off after being their third string goalie in the past 2 tournaments. Sucks to see him left off but we are going to have a very motivated goalie for the whole WJC stretch now.

[donjohnson]

Augustine and Fowler were the top 2 last year and both are returning this year and having strong seasons so it's likely that Oke would have been goalie #3 and probably wouldn't see much ice. I see that they went with a younger '05 goalie so they're probably trying to get the next generation on the squad since Fowler and Oke would both age out and the new 05 will likely backup Augustine next year for the 2025 World Juniors. Selfishly I'm glad that we'll have Oke here to keep climbing up the standings.

I don't think we'll see it this year but next year I expect that Misa and Parekh will both get a tryout spot at least for the 2025 tournament.

[MidlandSpiritFan]

Dionicio’s invite for the Swiss team was announced earlier today.

[MidlandSpiritFan]

Gavin Hayes from Flint got a USA invite.

[kingpin794]

First real competitive game of the tourney between Germany and Finland. Germany pulls off the upset and bears the Finns for the first time ever at the WJC. Finland now 0-2 after being beaten by Canada yesterday.

Dionicio and the Swiss lost to Slovakia
Czechia got beat down by the same Slovak team yesterday. Current up 2-0 on Norway in the first.

[kingpin794]

3 games in and Sweden hasn’t allowed a goal yet. Shut out the Canadians yesterday. They face Finland on New Year’s Eve

[MidlandSpiritFan]

Rodwin Dionicio had 2 goals in Switzerland’s 6-2 win over Norway today. That means the Swiss will take 4th in group B and move on to the quarterfinals against the 1st place team in group A which is Sweden.

[aj0512]

Czechia eliminated Canada today in the quarterfinals, 3-2 (game winning goal with 11 seconds left in the 3rd). It will be the first time since 2019 that Canada will not medal at the WJC.

Sapovaliv and his team will play in the semifinals this Thursday. Dionicio and the Swiss play later today as well. With Canada out we might see some trade talk heat up in the next couple of days.

[donjohnson]

It will be interesting to see if Rehkopf is back in the lineup for Thursday's game in Kitchener. I'm guessing not with the rough travel from Sweden but maybe he'll be ticked and want to take it out on Saginaw.

[donjohnson]

The other interesting player coming back from World Jrs is Poitras...all indications are that he'll go back up to Boston but I bet you'll see a conditional trade to acquire his rights. Since he's not an OA, I think he'd be able to report at any point in the season but maybe after a certain point he's not able to be returned. He's been playing well in Boston so I think it's unlikely that he gets sent back but we'll see.

[aj0512]

Sweden beats Switzerland in OT, 3-2. So a possible chance Dionicio could be back at some point this weekend. I noticed he was in the penalty box when Sweden scored in OT. I didn't see the penalty, but some of the calls going against the Swiss today were pretty bad to say the least. He had a really nice tournament, I thought.

Semifinals will be USA vs. Finland and Sweden vs. Czechia.

[MidlandSpiritFan]

Jan 2, 2024 16:24:58 GMT -5 aj0512 said:

Sweden beats Switzerland in OT, 3-2. So a possible chance Dionicio could be back at some point this weekend. I noticed he was in the penalty box when Sweden scored in OT. I didn't see the penalty, but some of the calls going against the Swiss today were pretty bad to say the least. He had a really nice tournament, I thought.

Semifinals will be USA vs. Finland and Sweden vs. Czechia.

The call at the end of OT to Dionicio was pretty soft. The spearing call that got changed to a slashing minor at the end of the 3rd period was a joke.

[MidlandSpiritFan]

Jan 2, 2024 11:27:26 GMT -5 donjohnson said:

It will be interesting to see if Rehkopf is back in the lineup for Thursday's game in Kitchener. I'm guessing not with the rough travel from Sweden but maybe he'll be ticked and want to take it out on Saginaw.

Don’t forget Mesar from Slovakia as well.

[aj0512]

One of the Kitchener media guys on Twitter wrote their WJC guys whose teams were eliminated likely won't be back in the lineup until Saturday. But I guess we'll find out tomorrow.

[MidlandSpiritFan]

Semi final #1 goes to Sweden 5-2. Roof caved in on Sapovaliv and Czechia in the 3rd period. Game was tied 2-2 after 2 periods.

Semi final #2 between the USA and Finland coming up at 1:30 pm on NHL Network.