Force players tally a total of five points in Team USA win

Fargo Force players Matt Leitner, Eamonn McDermott and Colten St. Clair tallied a total of five points for Team USA in a 6-1 win over Belarus.  Leitner tallied three assists, Eamonn McDermott posted his first point with an assist and Colten St. Clair added a late goal for Team USA in the win.

From USA Hockey:

SUMMERSIDE, P.E.I. - Led by Shane Berschbach's (Clawson, Mich./Indiana Ice) two goals and one assist, the U.S. Junior Select Team rolled past Belarus, 6-1, here tonight in its final preliminary-round game of the World Junior A Challenge at Credit Union Place in Summerside, P.E.I. With the victory, Team USA (1-0-1-0) secured second place in its group and will face Sweden Thursday (Nov. 5) in the quarterfinal round at 1 p.m. EST.

"I thought we played well tonight and had a lot of improvements in our game," said Mark Carlson, head coach of the 2009 U.S. Junior Select Team. "Even though the team hasn't been together for very long, everyone followed the plan and our power play and penalty kill worked well for us."

The U.S. garnered four power-play markers in the game, including two from Berschbach in the opening frame. While on a 5-on-3 advantage, Matt Leitner (Los Alamitos, Calif./Fargo Force), who was positioned in the high slot, sent a David Gerths' (Ankeny, Iowa/Lincoln Stars) pass to the left side of the net, where Berschbach fired the puck past Belarussian goaltender Stanislau Artynski to give Team USA a 1-0 lead at 14:42. Berschbach would net his second tally of the game 2:10 later when he directed another Leitner pass behind Artynski. Eamonn McDermott (Shaker Heights, Ohio/Fargo Force) collected his first assist of the tournament on the power-play goal.

In the second period, Team USA capitalized on another power play, with Berschbach and Leitner setting up Gerths at 7:27. Gerths took a Berschbach pass at the high slot and fired a onetimer over the netminder's blocker to give the U.S. a 3-0 lead. Derek DeBlois (East Greenwich, R.I./Cedar Rapids RoughRiders) extended Team USA's lead to 4-0 after Kevin Albers (Lake Orion, Mich./Green Bay Gamblers) sent a pass to Nic Dowd (Huntsville, Ala./Indiana Ice), who passed to DeBlois at the bottom of the left circle, where he buried the puck past the goaltender.

After holding Belarus scoreless for almost two periods, Kiryl Brykun made it a 4-1 game with :32 remaining in the middle frame.

The U.S. regained its four-goal lead with a marker from Beau Bennett (Gardena, Calif.) at 6:03 of the final stanza. Nick Mattson's (Chanhassen, Minn./Indiana Ice) shot from the blue line was tipped by Mike Parks (O'Fallon, Mo./Cedar Rapids RoughRiders) and knocked out of the air by Bennett past Artynski. Colten St. Clair (Gilbert, Ariz./Fargo Force) closed out the scoring with :23 remaining in the game when his shot off the rush from the right wing found the back of the net. Chris Crane (West Chester, Ohio/Green Bay Gamblers) collected an assist on the power-play tally.

U.S. netminder Eric Mihalik (Avon Lake, Ohio/Des Moines Buccaneers) turned aside 25 shots in the victory.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I wonder why Oleg Yevenko wasnt selected to play for Belarus? Is he too young and is there a certain age limit for the selects?I thought USA had 1 loss and were'nt 1-0-1. One more thing do the Force have more players on the select than any other team?

HockeyTrend said...

Not sure why Yevenko wasn't selected to play for Belarus.

The 1-0-1 isn't for a tie, they lost in OT to Canada East, I am assuming the last "1" is for an OTL.

The Force don't have more than any other team - Indiana has the most with 4, Cedar Rapids has 3 and Green Bay has 3. So they don't have the most, but they are up there.

Anonymous said...

Will the selects be held in Fargo or is that not possible? It would be great to see kids from the USHL playing together. Is it a rotation thing to ever get it here?

HockeyTrend said...

I think it is always held in Canada...that is a good question, I should look into that!

Anonymous said...

I was'nt involved with the Force at this time last year. Do you know if there was any Force players in the selects last year? If so who? And how did USA do in the tourney?

HockeyTrend said...

Mike Lee, Josh Birkholz. They won the Gold Medal last year! Mike Lee was a big part of that, too. He had amazing stats - .933 Save %, 1.75 GAA, 4-0 record. For more stats - http://www.hockeycanada.ca/index.php/ci_id/25036/la_id/1.htm

Anonymous said...

The USA team should win this every year as it is a Tier 1 team taking on Tier II teams. No team can have more than 3 players taken from it. The tournament is kind of a joke for the USHL to be playing in but that is what USA hockey wants.

nd hockey said...

Indiana has 4 on the roster though

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