World Juniors Recap – Canada 5, Sweden 1

Brennan Othmann scored twice and Connor Bedard added four assists to give Canada its third-consecutive win.

HALIFAX, N.S. – Canada's National Junior Team wrapped up preliminary-round action with its third-consecutive win at the 2023 IIHF World Junior Championship, finishing in second place in Group A after downing Sweden 5-1 on Saturday night.

Brennan Othmann (Pickering, Ont./Peterborough, OHL) led the offence with a pair of goals.
Joshua Roy (St-Georges-de-Beauce, Que./Sherbrooke, QMJHL), Tyson Hinds (Gatineau, Que./Sherbrooke, QMJHL) and Kevin Korchinski (Saskatoon, Sask./Seattle, WHL) rounded out the scoring.
Connor Bedard (North Vancouver, B.C./Regina, WHL) chipped in with four assists, tying a trio of Canadian records – most career points at the World Juniors (31), most points in single World Juniors (18) and most assists in a single World Juniors (12).
Brandt Clarke (Nepean, Ont./Los Angeles, NHL), Shane Wright (Burlington, Ont./Seattle, NHL), Logan Stankoven (Kamloops, B.C./Kamloops, WHL), Dylan Guenther (Edmonton, Alta./Arizona, NHL), Ethan Del Mastro (Freelton, Ont./Mississauga, OHL) and Nolan Allan (Davidson, Sask./Seattle, WHL) contributed one assist apiece.
Thomas Milic (Coquitlam, B.C./Seattle, WHL) made 22 saves.
Canada outshot Sweden 44-23.

Next Game:

Canada vs. Slovakia (quarterfinal) – Monday, Jan. 2 (7:30 p.m. AT/6:30 p.m. ET)

TSN and RDS, the official broadcast partners of Hockey Canada, are providing extensive coverage of the 2023 IIHF World Junior Championship, broadcasting all 31 tournament games. TSN Radio is also providing comprehensive tournament coverage.

Quotes:

“I thought we had a good game tonight, and we had a great start against a team that has not given up a lot of goals. We got on [Sweden] early and played fast, and we were able to keep the crowd into the game. The five-minute major set us back a bit similar to the Czechia game, but we had a good penalty kill and Milic did a great job helping us through it. We need to be a little more disciplined. We took a few penalties 200 feet from our net, and when we get down to a must-win game we need to do a better job of staying out of the box.”

- Head coach Dennis Williams (Stratford, Ont./Everett, WHL) on tonight’s win

“It was special [to play on home ice on New Year’s Eve]. It is something you grow up watching World Juniors as a kid, and to be in an important game against a tough opponent like Sweden was special. I feel like we are playing way better than at the start of the tournament. We are playing a more complete game and we are back to the hard-nosed style we want to play. We are starting to play well, and we have all four lines contributing, our defence are contributing and our goalies are playing great, and overall we played a strong game tonight.”

- Othmann on playing on New Year’s Eve and the team’s improvement

“I felt really good today. The more games we play in this tournament, for myself and for the team as a whole, we are settling in and gaining more confidence. As a team and personally, our confidence is going to continue to go up as we move into elimination games.”

“The crowd was amazing right from the start of warmups. It was such a great atmosphere to play in and the fans really helped us out tonight. Right from the start of puck drop, the energy was great and they helped us make an impact on the game right away.”

- Milic on the confidence of the team and the fans in Halifax

For more information on Hockey Canada and Canada’s National Junior Team, please visit HockeyCanada.ca, or follow along through social media on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and by using #WorldJuniors.