CANADA 6 - EISBAREN BERLIN 1
By Paul Romanuk

DAVOS – It was all offence, all the time, as Canada crushed Eisbaren Berlin 6-1 on day four of the 2005 Spengler Cup Championship. Berlin was playing its’ third game in as many days and was saddled with an afternoon game following a night game. It showed, as the team just seemed to run out of gas about half way through the second period.

Dale McTavish opened the scoring for Canada three minutes and 11 seconds into the game when he set up down low and tipped the puck past German goalie Youri Ziffzer. Canadian captain Yves Sarault scored just over six minutes later and it was off to the races for Canada.

The turning point of the game came at 6:10 of the second period. With Canada up 2-1, Ziffzer came out of his net to play the puck, He had trouble handling it, and Hnat Domenichelli, up fore checking, managed to tap the puck away from the net minder and towards the front of a wide open net. Jean Guy Trudel scored what was likely one of the easiest goals of his career to put Canada up 3-1. Berlin never recovered.

Dominic Pittis, Stacey Roest and McTavish rounded out the Canadian scoring as they finished the second period with a 6-1 lead.

“That sometimes can happen in a tournament, a team just sort of runs out of gas. It’s tough when you have to play three games in three days,” said McTavish.

“I really like the way we’re developing,” said Canadian forward Jeff Toms. ��This always happens, we look brutal in the first game and then by game three we look like a different team.”

Toms, playing on a line with Swiss League teammates Domenichelli and Trudel, has been one of Canada’s top players.

“It’s funny, we never play together in Ambri,” said Toms. “Hopefully the coach is watching some of these games and might get some ideas,” chuckled Toms. “We’ve really settled in nicely, being able to read and react of one another.”

Canada wraps up the round robin portion of the tournament on Friday afternoon with a game against Sparta Prague. Canada is now 2-1 in the tournament and right in the thick of things for a berth in the Championship Game on New Year’s Eve Day. The championship game features the top two teams from the four game round robin.

You can read more on this year’s Spengler Cup at Paul Romanuk’s blogsite.