World Junior daily recap: Overtime for all

Throughout the World Juniors tournament, we’ll be keeping track of all the action and bringing you all of the results in one place.

Slovakia vs. Kazakhstan

This afternoon saw Kazakhstan kick off their penultimate game of the preliminary round, and they came into it still looking for their first win since being promoted to the top, and while they still didn\'t find it today, they sure did get close.

It was a tough first period for them, as they found themselves in a three goal hole by the time the first intermission rolled around -- it was two goals for captain Dalibor Dvorskey and one for Jurah Perarcik, making for a pretty tidy effort for the Slovaks. Indeed, they had more goals in that first frame (3) than Kazakhstan had shots on goal (1). But they chipped away at it. Arthur Gross got them on the board early in the second, and while Slovakia was able to restore their three-goal advantage on Pekarcik\'s second goal of the night, Assanali Sarkenov brought them back within two before the second intermission.

And things went pretty wild from there. Slovakia kept them pretty well contained for much of the third period, and it looked like they might just be able to coast pretty easily to the win when Sarkenov took a major and a misconduct for crosschecking, and it was ruled that Slovakia would spend the last five minutes of the game on the power play. But Kazakhstan scored not once but twice shorthanded, and got themselves all the way back in this game, forcing overtime. It looked like luck was on their side in this one, but it did run out eventually -- Maxin Strbak scored just shy of three minutes into overtime, sealing the win for the Slovaks.

Final: Slovakia 5 – Kazakhstan 4 (OT) Next game up (SVK): TBD Next game up (KAZ): Dec 31, 12:00 ET vs.Switzerland

Germany vs. Latvia

This second and final game of the day began with a bang, with Germany scoring just 19 seconds into the game on a huge goal for Simon Seidl, scored right off the faceoff. It was a real tone setter for the Germans, but while they were able to take this momentum and control play pretty comfortably for the rest of the first period, it took them until they got on the power play in the second period (also their second attempt of the afternoon) before they could solve the Latvian goaltender again.

But Latvia responded pretty immediately to this goal -- just 32 seconds later, Eriks Mateiko got Latvia on the board and back within one goal. And they started to really roll from there, carrying some good momentum into the third period, and managing to tie things up early in the period, on a goal from Bruno Osmanis. Things got a little dicey for them late in the period, as they were sent on the penalty kill with about four minutes remaining, but Oliviers Murnieks came up huge with a shorthanded goal, sending the Germans into overdrive. They did manage to find the equalizer on that same power play, thanks to David Lewanoski, and off to overtime we went once again!

And in a nice bit of continuity, this was an equally relatively short overtime period as well. With Latvia controlling play just about the whole of the way, ultimately it was Mateiko who picked up his second of the night, and the game winner for Latvia.

Final: Latvia 4 – Germany 3 (OT) Next game up (LAT): Dec 31, 2:30 ET vs. Finland Next game up (GER): TBD

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