Jamie Umbach
GAME STATS: CANADA 5, BELARUS 2
PLANO, Texas – Shane Wright (Burlington, Ont./Kingston, OHL) and Mason McTavish (Carp, Ont./Peterborough, OHL) recorded a pair of goals each as Canada’s National Men’s Under-18 Team completed its run through the preliminary round Saturday at the 2021 IIHF U18 World Championship with a 5-2 win over Belarus.
The first-place finish in Group A means Canada will face the Czech Republic in the quarterfinals on Monday afternoon (4 p.m. ET/1 p.m. PT) in Frisco.
Wright and McTavish sit tied for the team lead in goals with five, despite Wright missing the last two games due to precautionary reasons not related to COVID-19.
Corson Ceulemans (Beaumont, Alta./Brooks, AJHL) tallied two assists and Olen Zellweger (Fort Saskatchewan, Alta./Everett, WHL) continued a stretch of strong play on the blueline by posting a goal and an assist following a three-helper performance against Switzerland on Friday.
Benjamin Gaudreau (Corbeil, Ont./Sarnia, OHL) was terrific once again in net for Canada, making a number of timely stops as part of a 26-save effort.
Canada breathed a sigh of relief in the opening five minutes when Belarus defenceman Nikita Parfenyuk struck the post after Gaudreau had to adjust to get a glove on the point shot.
Wright picked the pocket of Danila Klimovich at the blueline less than a minute later, wiring a shot past netminder Yan Shostak to open the scoring and announce his return.
Shane Wright's back and he's got Canada on the board! 🚨 pic.twitter.com/vYcX8j2TZN
— TSN (@TSN_Sports) May 2, 2021
Another crucial Gaudreau save, this time stopping Klimovich on an uncontested breakaway, led to Zellweger doubling Canada’s advantage when he was given space to walk in and bury a shot under the right pad of Shostak 1:26 before the intermission.
Canada enjoyed a 2-0 lead on the scoreboard, but Belarus hung around on the shot clock, with Canada holding a narrow 14-13 advantage through 20 minutes.
Another Belarus breakaway in the opening minute of the second period, this one by Fyodor Nikolayenya, was parried away smartly by Gaudreau before McTavish notched his first of the night not soon after for a 3-0 Canadian advantage.
After Wright was left all alone in front to make it 4-0 just 2:05 later, the Belarusians pulled one back with five-and-a-half minutes on the clock through Andrei Loshko’s power-play goal.
Canada weathered the Belarus storm, with McTavish looking off his teammates and scoring his second of the contest five-hole off an odd-man rush 7:28 into the third period.
Ilya Morozov finished off a nice passing play four minutes later that would only serve as consolation for Belarus, which will face Russia in its Monday quarterfinal.