USA crashes Switzerland, Canada eliminated at world juniors

OTTAWA, Ontario – Boston College teammates James Hagens and Ryan Leonard each scored twice and defending champion United States dispatched Switzerland 7-2 on Thursday in the world junior hockey quarterfinals.

Boston University’s Brandon Svoboda, Notre Dame’s Danny Nelson and Denver’s Zeev Buium also scored for Group A champion US Hampton Slukynsky of Western Michigan made 17 saves and BC’s Gabe Perreault had three assists.

“I thought we played a good back-and-forth game with them, got pucks behind them and went to work,” Svoboda said. “We’re a fast team and when we play like that we’re hard to beat. We watch video every day and if we can keep improving little things then we’ll continue to be successful.”

The Americans will face the Czech Republic in the semifinals after they beat Canada 4-3 with a last-minute goal in a late quarterfinal on Thursday.

“Overall, I thought we were ready to play and did what we needed to do against a good opponent in Switzerland,” said U.S. coach David Carle of Denver. “We are getting ready now for the semi-finals and looking forward to the challenge ahead.”

Nils Rhyn and Andro Kaderli scored for Switzerland.

Earlier, Group B winner Sweden beat Latvia 3-2. David Edstrom, Zeb Forsfjall and Anton Wahlberg scored for Sweden, and Melker Thelin made 11 saves. Eriks Mateiko scored twice for Latvia and Linards Feldbergs stopped 47 shots.

In the other quarter-finals at TD Place, Group B winners Sweden beat Latvia 3-2 and Finland topped Slovakia 5-3.

David Edstrom, Zeb Forsfjall and Anton Wahlberg scored for Sweden. Jesse Nurmi had two goals and an assist for Finland, a 4-3 overtime winner over the United States in group play.

In the relegation play-off, Maxim Schafer scored twice to help Germany beat Kazakhstan 4-3. Germany secured a place next season in the tournament, while Kazakhstan were relegated to the Division I Group A tournament.

Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.