Denmark continues stunning World Juniors run on awesome OT goal (Video)

On Tuesday, Denmark shocked the hockey world with an upset of Finland, the defending U-20 IIHF World Junior Champion.

On Thursday, Denmark showed they’re not out of tournament magic quite yet.

The Danes defeated the Czech Republic, 3-2, on Mathias From’s overtime winner at 0:47 at the Bell Centre in Montreal. It was the first win over the Czechs in tournament history for Denmark, following their first-ever win over Finland.

From, a Chicago Blackhawks draft pick in 2016, celebrated wildly after a dangle around a Czech defender and a quick backhand goal to end it.

Quite a talented young player. We look forward to him starring in Chicago, and then eventually being traded when they can’t afford him against the cap.

The Finns outshot the Danes, and the Czechs did the same at 34-22. But goalie Lasse Petersen was up to the task, although the game had some off moments. From IIHF.com:

The Czechs dominated play early on, keeping Danish goalie Lasse Petersen busy. Adam Musil went hard to the net, sliding a backhand and bumping Petersen’s pad. Necas nudged the puck over the line at 7:56, and the officials did not spot it until play stopped a minute and a half later. Video review confirmed it was good, and the 17-year-old HC Kometa Brno centre had his first World Junior goal.

Denmark then had a great chance on a breakaway, but Vladar foiled Blichfeld’s backhand deke. On the backcheck, Czech defenseman Daniel Krenzelok, took the net off its moorings and was assessed a delay of game penalty at 12:40, as his actions denied Jonas Rondbjerg a great scoring chance.

The Czechs thought they’d taken a two-goal lead shorthanded after the puck crazily bounced off the back boards for Lukas Jasek to put in at 14:26. But video review came to the rescue again. It showed that Jasek, standing in the crease, kicked the puck in, and it was waved off.

Weirdness!

The Danes, who lost the Sweden 6-1 in the opening game, have five points in their group after three games. They finish with the Swiss on Friday, who have two points (an OT win) in two games. The Swiss and Finland play on Saturday; the Finns have two losses and face Sweden on Thursday night.

So, bottom line: Cinderella Denmark has a clear path to advance to medal round play, but haven’t clinched yet.

Denmark advanced to the medal round in world juniors for the first time as a hockey nation in 2015, and then repeated the feat in 2016. They lost to Canada in 2015 and Russia in 2016, finishing eighth in both tournaments.

Is 2017 when the Danes finally “arrive” as a hockey power in the U-20 tournament, and challenge for a medal?

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Greg Wyshynski is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter. His book, TAKE YOUR EYE OFF THE PUCK, is available on Amazon and wherever books are sold.

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