Jokinen, Peltonen, Bouwmeester, and Magnus advance to semi's

A Florida Panther will be skating for three of the four teams that remain in the IIHF World Championships. Finland, with Olli Jokinen and Ville Peltonen, defeated David Booth, backup netminder Craig Anderson, and Team USA. Canada, with Jay Bouwmeester on the blueline, easily got past Norway. And Magnus Johansson continues on with Sweden, who defeated the Czech Republic. The final team in the semi-final round is Russia.

Olli Jokinen scored an assist on Finland's first goal, feeding Tuomo Ruutu for the opening tally. Finland went on to hold a 2-0 lead through 2 periods, before the Americans fought back to tie it, scoring both goals in the last 5 minutes of regulation. But Sami Lepisto's goal just over a minute into the overtime but the Fins through to the final four. Jokinen finished with 2 assists, while Peltonen managed 3 shots on goal during his 18+ minutes of ice time.

The Sweden vs. Czech Republic game also went to overtime at 2-2. Florida Panther Magnus Johansson set up Sweden's game tying goal with 4:38 remaining to send the game to extra time. Then, just 3:15 into the 4th period, Mattias Weinhandl sent Sweden on to the next round. Johansson had that assist during an impressive 22:31 of ice time.

Team Canada routed Norway 8-2. Bouwmeester, despite playing on the top defensive line, only saw a little over 12 minutes of ice time due to the blowout nature of the game. Bouwmeester managed just 1 shot on goal and was -1.

While there are only 4 Panther's players remaining, all 4 are solid contributors to their teams. Olli and Ville continue to provide an offensive threat for the Fins, while Bouwmeester and Johansson have been stalwart's on the blueline for their teams. Perhaps this kind of leadership that these players are in currently will bleed over to the 2008-2009 NHL season for the Cats? In any case, it is nice to see these guys playing well. Hopefully it will boost their confidence going into the offseason, and lead to a good beginning to the NHL season come October, which the Panthers have definatly been lacking the last couple seasons.

Semi-final action begins tomorrow at 1, with Russia vs. Finland. The second semi-final game features Canada vs. Sweden, with the puck dropping at 5. Again, for just $4.95 you can catch the semi's and the final game on www.wcsn.com

Panthers bites...

A quick little update on the recent goings-ons of the Florida Panthers.

The Panthers signed their first pick (10th overall) of the 2007 draft, 19 year old defenseman Keaton Ellerby. Despite standing 6'4", he weighs in at only 188 lbs. Granted, he's 19. A year or 2 and Ellerby could develop into and intimidating force on the Panthers blueline. He spent last season playing for the Moose Jaw Warriors of the Western Hockey League, where he played in 53 games, scored 2 goals, an impressive 21 assists, and logged 81 penalty minutes.

In the IIHF World Championships, the quarterfinal matchups are set, and 4 of the 8 teams remaining have Panther representation.

David Booth and Craig Anderson will be playing for Team USA as they take on Olli Jokinen and Ville Peltonen and Team Finland for the 2nd time in 4 days. The last meeting between the 2 teams was a thrilling, albeit controversial and violent game. Jokinen drew a match penalty late in the 1st period for checking American Tim Gleason from behind. The first Finnish goal came from Ville Koistinen, and appeared to actually go under the side of the net. Upon further review, the referrees deemed it was a good goal. Since then, however, the IIHF revealed after the game that Koistinen's shot had, indeed, entered the side of the net and should not have counted, and the video-goal judge will not be working for the rest of the tournament. The game ended with a minor melee, including a fight between David Backes and Anssi Salmela, who was bloodied. Both players received match penalties. No word yet on whether any suspensions from that game will carry over to tomorrow's quarterfinal matchup. Oh yea, Finland won the game, 3-2.

While Booth and Anderson have been largely absent from the American score sheet, Jokinen and Peltonen lead their team's offensive threats. In the Fins defeat of Lativa a few days earlier, the two Panthers combined for 20 shots and over 41 minutes of ice time.

Also tomorrow, Magnus Johansson and Sweden will play the Czech Republic. Johansson has been a solid presence for the Swedes, and has often been one of the leading ice-time getters.

Jay Bouwmeester and Canada will play Norway. Bouwmeester, like Johansson, has been seeing plenty of ice time on his team's top defensive pairing.

So be sure to tune your computers to www.wcsn.com tomorrow night to check out what's sure to be a great night of hockey.

Some Panthers still playing

The IIHF World Championships kicked off yesterday, and several Florida Panthers are out representing their countries. David Booth and backup netminder Craig Anderson are skating for Team USA, defenseman Magnus Johansson is representing Sweden, Jay Bouwmeester is playing for Canada, Panthers' prospect Janis Sprukts (now with Finnish club Lukko Rauma) is on the ice for Lativa, and Olli Jokinen and Ville Peltonen are playing for Finland.

In Friday's matchup, Jay Bouwmeester saw plenty of ice time, as he skated alongside former Panther favorite, Ed Jovanoski on the top defensive pairing for Canada. (Canada won easily, 5-1, outshooting Slovenia 65-23.)

While this is hardly the type of meaningful hockey I'd like to see the Panthers playing in, it is nice to see some Cats, both young and old, being recognized and asked to represent their country. Plus, Canada, Sweden, Finland, and the U.S. should make up the final four in this tournament, so it will be fun to see the Florida teammates go up against each other. So just because the Stanley Cup playoffs don't hold any Floridian representatives, there is still hockey being played with Floridian ties.

Preliminary rounds continue through the 13th. The quarerfinals then take place May 14, followed by the semi's on the 16th, and the medal games played on the 17th and 18th. (For just $4.95, you can watch every game at http://www.wcsn.com/)


4:32 pm edit: Ville Peltonen assisted on Finland's first goal, and Olli Jokinen just scored on a rocket one-time slapshot for Finland to put them up 2-0 in their game against Germany. Way to go Olli!

Sunday edit: Panthers' defenseman Branislav Mezei is also playing for Team Slovakia, who defeated Norway 5-1 yesterday. Apologies to Brani for leaving him off the list.