Kazakhstan suffer against Czechs, Drozg scores twice on Canada

After an impressive opening win over Norway, Kazakhstan came back down to earth in its second game at the 2023 World Championship. A 1-5 loss against the Czech Republic leaves the Kazakhs with two points from two games in Riga, good for fifth place in Group B.

The Czechs got in front in the ninth minute on a goal from Jakub Zboril, assisted by Vladimir Sobotka (ex Avangard) and Lukas Sedlak (ex Traktor). Sedlak picked up a second helper as Dominik Kubalik doubled the lead.

Kazakhstan recovered from 1-3 to beat Norway on Saturday and threatened a similar fightback today. Maxim Mukhametov, a scorer against the Norwegians, repeated that trick to halve the deficit in the middle frame.

However, there was no repeat. Sedlak added a goal to his two helpers, and Roman Cervenka assisted on a power play goal as the Czechs took control early in the third. The Czechs now have two wins from two and share top spot with Canada and Switzerland.

Despite the loss, Kazakhstan remains optimistic about its start to life at the championship.

“It was, I think, a good game,” Batyrlan Muratov told IIHF.com. “We weren’t ready for the first period but we woke up in the second. We lost, but it’s a good experience for us. We’re learning and we’re enjoying it.”

Drozg scores twice on Canada

Amur forward Jan Drozg scored twice for Slovenia as the newly promoted nation gave Canada a scare at the 2023 World Championship. Drozg, 24, is one of the few current KHLers called up to play at this year’s event and he repaid the selectors’ faith with a strong performance against one of the tournament favorites.

He stunned the Canadians when he opened the scoring on 3:50, converting the first power play of the game. Ziga Jeglic, who previously played with Slovan, Torpedo and Neftekhimik in a five-year KHL career, had an assist on that one.

Slovenia, which lost its opener 7-0 against Switzerland, held that lead until the first intermission. For Drozg, that’s a big sign of progress. 

“I think we played way better than in the last game,” he said. “I think we came out pretty strong, especially in the first period. We won that period. We were good but in the second period we gave away some lazy goals.
“After that it’s kinda hard to come back against a team like Canada. It is what it is, but I think we learned a lot from today’s game.” 

For Canada, MacKenzie Weegar kept up his fast start to the tournament. The defenseman had a goal and an assist, moving him to 6 (2+4) points from two games before Drozg potted a late consolation for Slovenia.

In Tampere, Sweden collected its second victory of the tournament with a 5-0 success over Austria. Par Lindholm, who played for Ak Bars in 2021-2022, opened the scoring for the Tre Kronor early on.

In the early Group A action, Hungary took an early lead against the USA but fell to a 1-7 loss. Later, Denmark edged France 4-3 in overtime. The Danes scored three goals on the power play. The other Group B game in Riga ended with Switzerland defeating Norway 3-0. That’s the first time since 1939 that the Swiss have started a World Championship with two shut-out wins.

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