WJC: 2020 IIHF WM U20 D1A in Minsk, BELARUS (9.12 - 15.12 2019)

[kabidjan18]

The lack of a stream is frustrating.

As expected, line 1 is the only source of offense.

 

[SoundAndFury]

While posting here yesterday I didn't realise Belarus are playing Latvia so early in the tournament. That definitely plays in Latvian favor. Having said that, how bad Denmark played against Slovenia also devalues strong Latvian performance yesterday a little bit.

Austria meanwhile solidifies themselves as the 3rd team in the division. You might only have one line but stars is what wins these tournaments.

 

[jibbz]

The lack of a stream is frustrating.

As expected, line 1 is the only source of offense.

The second line has been pretty dangerous too, #18 especially

 

[iginlafan77]

Denmark is really weak this year, that's for sure. One of their worst teams in recent memory. Sogaard needs to steal games for them if they want to have a chance against Belarus or Latvia.

Pettersen isn't attending either from what I understand? Or is he doing some weird thing like joining the team late like last year?

Not going. Haven't seen an injury or anything like that, speculation is he didn't want to leave his college team.

 

[passive voice]

Belarus getting Austria and Latvia outta the way immediately is nice. If they get a W today the rest of the tournament will be a coronation.

 

[Artorius Horus T]

Pretty lame effort from Protas.

 

[Artorius Horus T]

PP1 couldn't score, PP2 scores for Belarus.

 

[Namejs]

Kinda meh so far

 

[SoundAndFury]

Brants did not have a good game, did he...

Very nice. So this is now Latvia's tournament to lose.

 

[Namejs]

Nicely done. I mean, we should have gotten 3 points out of this, but 2 is fine.

I'm not sure if I'm biased, but I thought we were the better team.

Or as everyone else would say, wow such an upset.

 

[kabidjan18]

The irony that all the belarusian fans here will be Austria fans come this Friday morning.

 

[kabidjan18]

The second line has been pretty dangerous too, #18 especially

Eh. His name is Tim Harnisch. He's really good for one thing. He's a constant offensive solo threat. He loves to style on teams. But he heavily under-utilizes his teammates. Belarus was a good example of the higher the competition level gets, the harder it is for him to go 1v5. Belarus shut him down, and so the second line did absolutely nothing that game. But he is without a shadow of a doubt the best offensive forward not on the first line. He's always been that player who we look at and we're like "he'd be so talented if he learned to work with others."

Line 2 is just a really weird line. #14 Benny Lanzinger is a sniper, but he's small and not very fast, so he has a lot of trouble setting up his own shots. He almost always requires someone else to set him up. That's definitely not going to be Tim Harnisch, at least not consistently, because Harnisch doesn't like giving the puck up. #11 Max Rebernig is extremely good in front of the net. Tips, blocking out, obstructing vision, getting rebounds, he's good at all that stuff, best in our system actually. But he can't reliably handle the puck. So he can't set up his own chances, and he doesn't often set up others either. So Lanzinger wants passes but has no one to pass it to him. Rebernig wants good shots from the point to rebound or deflect but he can't really set that up either, and neither can Lanzinger, and Harnisch just wants to go 1v5. Which works sometimes and sometimes not as well as other times.

 

[Latgale_fan]

I'm not sure if I'm biased, but I thought we were the better team.

Didn't see the game but shots on goal kinda indicate that too, especially taking into account we had more penalty minutes. Even though, of course, for a majority of the game perhaps Belarus would play defensively more. This year we had lost 0:1 to Belarus already twice in U20 prep games, so I feared it would happen again...

 

[ozo]

Who the hell is Belarus coach? I heard him asking his own players which position they are playing during the TV time-outs. That is some level of incompetence.

 

[kunabai]

Who the hell is Belarus coach? I heard him asking his own players which position they are playing during the TV time-outs. That is some level of incompetence.

almighty dmitri dudik, the greatest torturer of sweden and canada in 02 olympics

 

[kunabai]

Nicely done. I mean, we should have gotten 3 points out of this, but 2 is fine.

I'm not sure if I'm biased, but I thought we were the better team.

Or as everyone else would say, wow such an upset.

for sure you were. after the first period latvia looked better almost in every facet of the game.

i wrote earlier that if belarus don't elevate their game there will be problems. and there were big problems. offence sucked, pp worked sometimes thanks to skill of certain players but not because it clicked well, lack of good players on the dot became crucial and so on (also dudik is doing everything to make protas useless).

totally deserved win for lativa, congrats guys

 

[jibbz]

Eh. His name is Tim Harnisch. He's really good for one thing. He's a constant offensive solo threat. He loves to style on teams. But he heavily under-utilizes his teammates. Belarus was a good example of the higher the competition level gets, the harder it is for him to go 1v5. Belarus shut him down, and so the second line did absolutely nothing that game. But he is without a shadow of a doubt the best offensive forward not on the first line. He's always been that player who we look at and we're like "he'd be so talented if he learned to work with others."

Line 2 is just a really weird line. #14 Benny Lanzinger is a sniper, but he's small and not very fast, so he has a lot of trouble setting up his own shots. He almost always requires someone else to set him up. That's definitely not going to be Tim Harnisch, at least not consistently, because Harnisch doesn't like giving the puck up. #11 Max Rebernig is extremely good in front of the net. Tips, blocking out, obstructing vision, getting rebounds, he's good at all that stuff, best in our system actually. But he can't reliably handle the puck. So he can't set up his own chances, and he doesn't often set up others either. So Lanzinger wants passes but has no one to pass it to him. Rebernig wants good shots from the point to rebound or deflect but he can't really set that up either, and neither can Lanzinger, and Harnisch just wants to go 1v5. Which works sometimes and sometimes not as well as other times.

Well I only watched today's game so far, so I can't comment on what happened in the first game, but today he did look good today and did generate some quality opportunities. His solo runs worked very well too, so I didn't think too much about him not passing the puck as often as he probably should, I just assumed he only made those runs because he saw an opportunity develop right in front of him. If he's always that selfish even when his runs don't work as you say though, then I hope he can sort that out in the future because he looks like a very talented guy

But yeah it's pretty obvious that this team lives and dies with its first line. Baumgartner especially looks supremely good. Having watched each team play once so far, he stood out the most. A shame Rossi isn't playing here, those two guys playing together could have provided an awesome offensive spectacle

 

[SoundAndFury]

But yeah it's pretty obvious that this team lives and dies with its first line. Baumgartner especially looks supremely good. Having watched each team play once so far, he stood out the most. A shame Rossi isn't playing here, those two guys playing together could have provided an awesome offensive spectacle

Just an interesting aside, those guys playing together couldn't win promotion from U18 D1B and were downed by mighty Ukraine. Not particularly relevant but goes to show Belarus not winning this division was not the biggest of upsets, I guess.

 

[jibbz]

Just an interesting aside, those guys playing together couldn't win promotion from U18 D1B and were downed by mighty Ukraine.

Damn I didn't know that. I guess that's still hockey, anything can happen especially in only one single game. But that probably shouldn't have happened

 

[kabidjan18]

Well I only watched today's game so far, so I can't comment on what happened in the first game, but today he did look good today and did generate some quality opportunities. His solo runs worked very well too, so I didn't think too much about him not passing the puck as often as he probably should, I just assumed he only made those runs because he saw an opportunity develop right in front of him. If he's always that selfish even when his runs don't work as you say though, then I hope he can sort that out in the future because he looks like a very talented guy

But yeah it's pretty obvious that this team lives and dies with its first line. Baumgartner especially looks supremely good. Having watched each team play once so far, he stood out the most. A shame Rossi isn't playing here, those two guys playing together could have provided an awesome offensive spectacle

Oh he always sees those opportunities develop right in front of him

But yes, he is very talented. And to be fair to him, he is improving at being a teammate over the years. He's still not a great passer, and that still feels willful, but I think it's definitely true that myself and others have that syndrome where you remember a guy like he was when he was a kid and you don't recognize he's changed. He still needs to improve there no question. For instance, he got invited to the senior club team to practice, and got sent back down. Whereas like Marcel and Filip got to play games, and Kilian Zundel got to play games (Kili is a defenseman so it's hard to compare). He's better than most the players who've gotten to play EBEL, even the EBEL 4th line regulars, but he's not better at playing a 4th line role and that's kinda what's held him back.

They've played together ever since they were 14, that I can remember, and I'm sure before I got on the scene as well, and yeah, it's been a spectacle every time. You'll probably get to see both of them at the D1A Men's this spring. Baumgartner is doing great. His offensive game has always been there but defensively I think he's improved quite a bit.

 

[kabidjan18]

Just an interesting aside, those guys playing together couldn't win promotion from U18 D1B and were downed by mighty Ukraine. Not particularly relevant but goes to show Belarus not winning this division was not the biggest of upsets, I guess.

It wasn't their fault. It's weird because this 00-01 class was supposed to be the "golden generation." And they just disappointed so many times that now we don't believe in them anymore. But the talent is still kinda there. This has been the best WJC by far, that I can remember, and it's because so many people have improved or developed their games finally to where we thought they would be, but where we thought they would be like 1-2 years ago. I mean, Rossi, Baumi, Nickl, Hochegger, Huber, Harnisch, Payr, Maier, Peeters, Zundel even Lanzinger we all knew they could be good years ago, but they all had to go through the process.

We'll see. I thought these guys would be ready for the big stage a while back. And it didn't turn out that way. And that's why I think I care less about the U20 this year, because we're looking at the process, not the result. Top priority is we have to get these guys stable jobs on their senior club teams, and then playing time, and in order to do that they still have to improve. It's only an added benefit that the result hasn't been too shabby recently.

 

[Namejs]

I had this realization just now that I didn't mention that we have a talented, ambitious, young coaching staff. Zirnis is a smart Xs and Os guy and he's working alongside Vilkoits, who's turned HK Riga from a dumpster fire into a well-oiled playoff team in the MHL, and Francis Anzalone, who has worked for years with juniors in the USHL and NAHL.

And they're all really passionate about what they do and they know what they're doing.

As for Belarus and their coaching staff. I'll let the local Belarusians comment on that.

I really hope we don't screw this up against Norway and Austria. It would be a nice story and a very solid all-around 2021 WJC squad for Latvian standards.

I love the way our Latvian philosophy of hockey, of being this hard-working, gritty, speedy, relentless, disciplined team is now also showing at the junior levels. Not a lot of showboating nonsense. And it's a treat to watch, when it works.

And while I definitely agree that it's all aboit the senior national team, getting to the Elite WJC always provides an opportunity to at least a couple of players who would have otherwise stayed in the MHL/KHL/Latvia as 20+ year olds, which is a terrible thing for player development in our case.

So qualifying is a big deal.

 

[AUAIOMRN]

Old-style IIHF page, if anyone's interested:

2020 IIHF Ice Hockey U20 World Championship Div I Group A

 

[swissexpert]

Really liked the Austrians against Norway, first line is fantastic and defense better than expected!

Will be a fun game against Danmark, I don't think Baumgartner and Co are huge underdogs here.

 

[SoundAndFury]

Will be a fun game against Danmark, I don't think Baumgartner and Co are huge underdogs here.

I think both looking at the rosters and at the level of play so far Austrians are the favorites in that one.