World Junior 2015: Canada to face familiar foe in Finland's Saros

BROSSARD, Que. — The Finns are making some bold moves in preparation to face Team Canada on Monday night.

In the morning, head coach Hannu Jortikka announced that goaltender Juuse Saros would start for Finland, thus far winless (0-0-1-1) at the tournament. The 19-year-old had a shaky outing in the team’s 2-1 upset loss to Slovakia, giving up two goals on the first seven shots. On the other hand, Ville Husso, his partner in the Finnish goaltending tandem, turned in a solid 36 save performance against the U.S., in a shootout loss.

In the 2014 world junior championship in Malmo, Sweden, Saros was voted a tournament all-star. He helped beat Canada in the semifinal with a 23 save effort en route to a 5-1 victory. The Finns eventually won gold and the Canadians came home without a medal for the second year in a row.

“We have two good goalies and of course Saros made one mistake (against Slovakia) everybody knows that,” said Jortikka after practice. “But last year, you can see that he almost alone won the gold medal for Finland. You must respect that.”

Given that history, Team Canada will be facing a familiar foe in the Nashville Predators prospect. Canadian coach Benoit Groulx was an assistant coach behind the bench in Malmo, so he has a scouting report ready.

“He’s a small goalie who is very quick,” said Groulx of the 5-foot-11, 180-pound goalie. “He competes hard. He never quits, he can be out of position, but he’s going to battle and he’s going to battle hard. We will have to finish every play at the net and make sure we bear down if we have a chance and put traffic in front of him.”

Many of Canada’s returning players – including starting goaltender Zach Fucale – say they’re not worried with what happened last year, though he might use it as a little motivation. As far as Groulx is concerned, he’s not going to dwell on the past either.

“Last year is last year,” said Groulx. “It’s totally different this year. Personally I think it’s a different challenge tonight, we’re both different teams and it’s an important game for us. We want to get better today and it’s a good challenge and I can’t wait to see how we respond to that challenge.”

Canada is rolling along undefeated at 2-0 and have outscored the opposition 12-0 in two games. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Finland has only managed two goals in two games at the tournament – both coming from 18-year-old Mikko Rantanen.

As a result Jortikka has demoted Pittsburgh Penguins first-round pick Kasperi Kapanen off the top line with Artturi Lehkonen and Aleksi Mustonen for the game against Canada because it’s not producing.

“Two games and nothing is happening on the power play or the first line,” said Jortikka. “So you (have to) try something else.”

Meanwhile Groulx announced Monday morning that he was going back to Canada’s regular lines. He had been tinkering with them during the third period of their 4-0 victory over Germany, but decided to keep his pairings intact.

“They have good flow right now,” said Jortikka of Canada. “They have played quite strong.

“Always Finland plays good against Canada, in juniors and at the world championships, too. We trust that we can play a good game tonight.”