MONCTON, New Brunswick (AP) — Dalibor Dvorsky, Robert Baco and Filip Mesar scored in a 3:19 span in the second period and Slovakia beat the United States 6-3 on Wednesday in the world junior championship.
Libor Nemec, Peter Repcik and Alex Ciernik also scored for Slovakia and captain Simon Nemec — the No. 2 overall NHL pick by New Jersey this year, had three assists in the Group B game.
“After this game, you can’t be tired,” Simon Nemec said after playing a game-high 25:31. “A lot of good things in this game.”
In Group A in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada bounced back from an opening loss to rout Germany 11-2 in the night game.
Adam Gajan made 33 saves to help Slovakia rebound from an opening 5-2 loss to Finland on Tuesday.
“I thought their goaltender was the best player on the ice tonight,” U.S. coach Rand Pecknold of Quinnipiac said. “That said, we need to tighten things and our guys know that."
Tyler Boucher of the Ontario Hockey League's Ottawa 67's scored twice for the United States. Michigan forward Gavin Brindley added a goal and Colorado College goalie Kaidan Mbereko made 20 saves. The Americans opened Monday with a 5-2 victory over Latvia.
The U.S. will face Switzerland on Thursday.
“I think we’re going to have a bounce-back here,” Boucher said. “We’re hungry.”
Canada rebounded from a 5-2 loss to the Czech Republic in its opener Monday to blow out Germany.
Connor Bedard had three goals and four assists and Dylan Guenther also had three goals. The Canadians will face Austria on Thursday.
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