Canada moved into the Spengler Cup semifinals with a decisive 6-3 win over KalPa Kuopio on Friday evening. There the Canadians will battle Dynamo Pardubice for a final berth at 8.15pm.

Only 308 seconds were played when KalPa’s coach Petri Karjalainen took his timeout. His teamwas already trailing 2-0. Jonathan Ang converted a wonderful pass from Derek Grant on the powerplay (4 th minute of play), John Quenneville successfully redirected a shot by Joey Laleggia moments later. The Scandinavians subsequently found their footing and created scoring opportunities. They acted more aggressively and suffered some bad luck hitting the goalpost (15 th minute). In the second period, the young Finns even pushed ahead tenaciously. But they lacked efficiency on the finish and some luck as well, as Benjamin Korhonen only hit the post again (32 nd minute). But with their courageous offensive game, KalPa also opened up to Canadian counterattacks, such that goaltender Juha Jatkola was constantly called to action. And he was beaten again on the second Canadian powerplay. Chris DiDomenico increased the lead for the team from overseas 76 seconds before the second intermission. Jonathan Hazen and Guillaume Asselin decided the game with two more Canadian goals early in the third period. Thanks to markers from Colby Sissons, Jaakko Rissanen, and Kaspar Simontaival, they did muster up three goals and an honourable final score. With this win Team Canada revenged themselves for the final loss in 2018. Then KalPa had sensationally won 2-1 in a shootout and, as the first Finnish team ever, won the Spengler Cup.

Tonight, the Canadians will once again have the opportunity to qualify for New Year’s Eve’s final game when they face Dynamo Pardubice in their semi-final matchup.