As the preliminary round comes to a close, some intriguing match-ups loom in the next round. However, all roads go through Canada in this tournament.
The Preliminary Round of competition came to an exciting conclusion yesterday in Prague, Czech Republic, with a series of closely contested games. The United States, undoubtedly caught looking ahead a bit, had their hands full with a tenacious Slovakia team, ultimately prevailing 5 - 4. Slovakia, which finished fifth in Group B, was somewhat of a hard luck story this tournament, and played much better than its nine points would indicate. The Slovaks had only two regulation losses in their seven games, and took four games to overtime, splitting those contests.