The German U18 national team suffered its third defeat at the IIHF U18 World Championships in the USA. U18 national coach Steffen Ziesche's team lost 1:6 (0:1, 0:3, 1:2) to the highly favored team from Russia, but can build on a courageous first third. The goal for the selection of the Deutscher Eishockey-Bund was scored by Connor Korte (55./U20 HC Davos). DEB-Goalie Nikita Quapp (Krefeld Pinguine) fended off 34 of 40 shots on goal; 16-year-old Matvey Mishkov stood out for Russia with four goals.
In the opening period, Sbornaja's Ziesche team was initially an equal opponent, came dangerously in front of the Russian goal a few times and allowed relatively few opportunities. Nevertheless, Danila Jurow (11th) gave head coach Albert Leschjow's team the lead. Mitschkow (21st) then increased the score to 2-0 in lacrosse style at the start of the second third, giving his team an enormous boost. It was Mitschkow (28th, 36th) himself who scored to make it 3-0 and 4-0.
The final section was designed by DEB-Selection then became much more balanced again, Ilja Kvotschko (46th) and again Mitschkow (59th) still scored further Russian goals. At least Korte rewarded the German team's efforts with the goal to make it 1:5 when he beat Bennet Roßmy (Lausitzer Füchse) and Roman Zap (Jungadler Mannheim) used the rebound. Zap also failed with a penalty in the second period shortly before the third goal was scored.
Next night, the German team will play its final World Cup match, as the quarter-finals are no longer within reach after the third defeat. Against Finland (3 a.m. German time/live on thefan.fm), the DEB-Young talent once again show a committed performance.
U18 national coach Steffen Ziesche: “Russia played very well, we had a lot of problems with their speed. The result was too many mistakes, too many mistakes in our third. The Russians are very strong offensively and don't need that many chances to score. We will now recover and then want to perform against Finland like we did in the last games. Compared to today’s game, we obviously want to improve, play with more ease, more consistently in our own third without too many turnovers.”
Connor Korte: “We didn't play as easily as we did against the USA, weren't ready to the same extent and had a lot of turnovers. Hats off to Mitschkov, he is very talented and had a perfect game against us.”
Roman Zap: "I was happy about the penalty shot, I wanted to stay calm and do my thing, but the goalie saved well. We want to play better against Finland than we did today and show that we have the ability to win against them."