Team Canada was stacked for the World Championship this season. Sidney Crosby decided to head to the annual competition with his good friends Marc-Andre Fleury and Nathan MacKinnon. Needless to say, Team Canada was earmarked as the favourite to win the tournament, but the game is played on the ice, not on paper.
After a successful group stage in which the Canadians only dropped one game against Finland in the shootout, the favourites had a date with Denmark in the quarterfinals on Thursday. Against its home crowd, the tournament co-hosts shocked the world, mainly because of a former Montreal Canadiens prospect: goaltender Frederic Dichow.
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Canada didn’t play badly; they peppered the Danes’ net with 40 shots, but they could only beat Dichow once, early in the third period, when Travis Sanheim converted on assists from Sidney Crosby and Travis Konecny. With 4 Nations Face-Off winning goaltender Jordan Binnington in the net, Canada hoped it would be enough, but it wasn’t.
With less than three minutes to go in regulation, Nikolaj Ehlers, who had recently joined the team following the Winnipeg Jets’ elimination, scored the game-tying goal. However, Denmark didn’t want to go to overtime, and they pressed on, scoring the game-winning goal through Nick Olesen. Alternate captain Patrick Russell got a pair of assists, significantly contributing to Denmark’s historic win.
Still, without Dichow’s heroics, the result wouldn’t have been the same. With 39 stops on 40 shots, he ended the game with an unreal .975 save percentage. The Habs never offered the former Canadiens’ fifth-round pick at the 2019 draft an entry-level contract. In his first two seasons post-draft, he had pretty good years, but when he graduated to Frolunda in the Swedish league in 2022-23, he kept an 8-7-0 with a 2.76 goals-against average and a .898 SP.
While he may never make it to the NHL, he’ll forever be able to say he stood tall against a star-studded Canadian side, stopping four shots from MacKinnon and just as many from Crosby. His performance means Canada will finish fifth in the final standings. This comes after Dichow was his country’s hero in their final group stage game, stopping all four German players in the shootout to secure a 2-1 win and ensure the country’s qualification for the playoff stage. Denmark now has a date with Switzerland on Saturday for the semifinals.
Pictured: Feb 11, 2022; Beijing, China; Denmark goalkeeper Frederik Dichow (1) makes a save against ROC defender Vyacheslav Voinov (27) in men's ice hockey Group B play during the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games at National Indoor Stadium. Photo Credit: Peter Casey-Imagn Images
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