Slovakia 2, Belarus 1 ~ Jan.2 /SEMIFINAL ROUND/RELEGATION
Slovakia, Switzerland to play for seventh place;
Germany and Belarus knocked out of next year's tournament
Posted on Mon, Jan. 03, 2005
Kevin Fee
Herald Staff Writer
The qualifiers for the 2006 World Junior Championship have been decided.
Slovakia locked up a spot in next year's event with a 2-1 victory against Belarus in WJC relegation play Sunday in Grand Forks' Ralph Engelstad Arena.
Slovakia and Switzerland will be the seventh- and eighth-place teams in this year's tournament. Germany and Belarus lost their spots in the 2006 event, and will have to qualify next winter for the 2007 event.
But there are still relegation games to play. Belarus and Germany will meet for ninth place and Switzerland and Slovakia will play for seventh place today.
Slovakia needed a goal from Peter Olvecky with 3 minutes, 25 seconds remaining in the third period to get past Belarus.
Olvecky also had an assist for Slovakia, which improved to 2-0 in relegation play.
Konstantin Zakharov staked Belarus to a 1-0 lead with an unassisted goal in the second period.
But Slovakia's Andrej Sekera tied it at 10:03 of the third period before Olvecky scored the winner.
Jaroslav Halak stopped 25 of 26 shots, including seven in the third period, for Slovakia.
Slovakia coach Dusan Gregor said he's pleased his team qualified for next year's tournament. "On the other side, I feel this team didn't achieve what it came here to acheive," he said.
Slovakia will have to settle for seventh or eighth place.
