After Czechia and Sweden won on Thursday, the Swiss Ice Hockey Games continued on Saturday with a pair of games in Fribourg. In the early game, Finland shut out Sweden to even both teams’ records, while the Czechs won to go 2-0, with the host Swiss falling to 0-2.
The Euro Hockey Tour standings are cumulative, with all teams now having played five games. The standings are now: 1. Czechia 12 points; 2. Finland 11 points, 3. Sweden 4 points, 4. Switzerland 3 points.
After Sunday’s games, the Swiss Ice Hockey Games will be complete and the 2024-25 Euro Hockey Tour will be halfway done.
Finland 3 – Sweden 0 (1-0, 1-1, 1-0)
Kalle Kossila scored in the first period and Markus Nurmi and Santtu Kinnunen widened the lead with two goals 38 seconds apart in the second, with Antti Suomela and Lauri Pajuniemi each drawing two assists to lead Finland to a 3-0 win in a renewal of the classic Nordic hockey rivalry.
The Finns outshot the Swedes 30-23, with Christian Heljanko stopping everything his way to record the shutout.
[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vb3xDRxbsoM[/embed]
Switzerland 0 – Czechia 2 (0-2, 0-0, 0-0)
The Czechs got first-period goals from Filip Zadina and Matěj Stranský and that’s all the offense they’d need, as goaltender Šimon Zajíček recorded the day’s second shutout.
“He didn't make a mistake the whole game – he was everywhere,” Czech coach Radim Rulík said about the 23-year-old HC Litvínov netminder. “In the second period, there was a problem when we weren’t able to change players while the Swiss made two or three changes, but even there he managed everything. The players' dedication also helped – we blocked a lot of shots. The home crowd was pushing the Swiss – they might have had a bit of an advantage visually.”
[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3udTWH-IBg[/embed]