OTTAWA, Ontario — Boston College teammates James Hagens and Ryan Leonard each scored twice, and the defending champion United States routed 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 the Group A champion U.S. 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’re watching video every day, and if we can keep improving little things then we’ll continue to be successful.”
The Americans will face Czechia — which scored in the final minute to beat Canada 4-3 in the night game at Canadian Tire Centre — on Saturday. Group B winner Sweden will play Finland in the other semifinal.
“Overall, I thought we were ready to play and did what we needed to do against a good opponent in Switzerland,” U.S. coach David Carle of Denver said. “We’ll get ready now for the semifinals and look forward to the challenge in front of us.”
Nils Rhyn and Andro Kaderli scored for Switzerland.
Adam Jecho scored on a one-timer on a power play with 39.4 seconds left to lift Czechia past Canada. Bradly Nadeau had tied it for Canada with 4:18 remaining. Czechia got the late power play when Andrew Gibson was called for kneeing.
Petr Sikora, Jakub Stancl and Eduard Sale also scored for the Czechs in their second straight quarterfinal victory over Canada. Michael Hrabal made 29 saves.
Tanner Howe and Porter Martone added goals for Canada, and Carter George stopped 22 shots.
At TD Place, 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 game, Maxim Schafer scored twice to help Germany beat Kazakhstan 4-3. Germany secured a spot next season in the tournament, while Kazakhstan was demoted to the Division I Group A tournament.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.