When I noted in the game thread that no one had made Switzerland look bad in the tournament, nor beat them in regulation, I was mostly attempting to make a boring looking game look entertaining. Little did I know that the Swiss would not only outplay Russia, but put them on the brink of elimination on home ice.
It seems like Andrei Vasilevski is going to get the nod going forward for Russia, and once again they got excellent goaltending as he stopped 41 of 44 shots en route to the win.
Alexander Kokhlachyov got the scoring started for Russia off of a pass from Nail Yakupov, but it was under 4 minutes before Switzerland tied it with a goal from Christof Bertschy.
In the second period, Mikhail Grigorenko finally broke through and scored to put the Russians ahead again, but again the lead didn’t last, as Martin Ness tied it just over 3 minutes later.
The tables turned in the third period, Sven Andrighetto scored to give the Swiss their first lead of the game. It took a powerplay and a pulled goalie in the final couple minutes for Nikita Kucherov to capitalize on a Grigorenko rebound and tie the game.
Overtime solved nothing, so a shootout was needed. Once again it was Grigorenko and Kucherov doing the scoring, which gave Russia the eked out win.
Russia now faces Sweden tomorrow morning at 8:00AM EST, and after watching them be outshot 44-34 by the Swiss, I would lean towards Sweden winning that game. Seems like once again Russia will be depending on goaltending to bail them out.
