Slovakia forward Tomas Marcinko didn't mince words when asked whether Canada lured the Slovaks into too many penalties in their loss at the world under-20 tournament yesterday.
"There was also kind of lots of dives from their side, but the score is 2-0 and that's it," the Barrie Colts forward said.
The officiating was suspect because the Russian referee and his German partner were rather whistle happy in Canada's victory, but Canada never has been accused at this event of being a bunch of divers. Marcinko's words surprised a couple of Canadian players when the remarks were relayed. But they refused to get into a war of words.
Instead, the Canadian juniors were pleased to open up the tournament with back-to-back shutouts — for the first time in Canada's history at the world junior championship — but concerned they weren't able to execute better in man-advantage situations.
The Canadians went 2 for 12 on the power play with one of Kyle Turris's two goals coming during Canada's second 5-on-3 advantage of the game.
"When you don't score on the power play, it's a bit of a downer," said Canadian defenceman Karl Alzner, whose shot Turris deflected for the first goal early in the second period.
"We can't seem to figure it out," Alzner said. "When we had the puck down low, we were having difficulty getting the puck back up high and when we had the puck up high, nobody was getting open down low."
Canada's puck movement in the offensive zone was slow and at sometimes non-existent on the power play. As a result, Canadian coach Craig Hartsburg will no doubt stress better, swifter puck movement at practice today in preparation for his team's next game, against Sweden tomorrow.
London Knights goalie Steve Mason followed up Jonathan Bernier's 44-save, opening-game shutout with an impressive 22-stop outing to become the 12th Canadian goalie to earn a shutout in his first world junior appearance.
"For a team to get two shutouts in such a big tournament is definitely a credit to the entire team," Mason said.
When Mason retired to his single room (both he and Bernier are the only players who have single rooms at the team's hotel, the other 20 players have roommates), he had difficulty sleeping because Hartsburg had yet to make up his mind on his starting goaltender. The two were informed in the morning and Bernier already knows he will be starting against Sweden.
The Canadians should be in a better frame of mind against Sweden. Hartsburg could tell his players were emotionally and mentally exhausted after their opening 3-0 victory against the host Czechs in a hostile environment and as a result had difficulty finding the same level less than 18 hours later against Slovakia.
"This was a tough start [to the tournament]," Hartsburg said. "Our emotional level was down, but we found a way."
Meanwhile, Canada extended its team record to 20 consecutive wins at this tournament. It has eight shutouts and outscored the opposition 91-20 in this stretch.
