Canada advances to eighth straight world juniors championship

OTTAWA -- Jordan Eberle and John Tavares scored in a shootout and Canada beat Russia 6-5 on Saturday night to advance to world junior hockey championship final for the eighth straight season.
Eberle, a first-round pick of the Edmonton Oilers who plays for the Regina Pats in the Western Hockey League, scored twice in regulation, the second with 5 seconds left and goalie Dustin Tokarski off for an extra attacker.
"I didn't ever give up and I think that's the biggest thing for Team Canada," Eberle said. "We didn't give up all throughout the game.
"We obviously realize the pressure on us, but pressure is one of those things you just push aside and you apply it, rather than feel it."
Canada will face Sweden -- a 5-3 winner over Slovakia in the first semifinal -- on Monday night. Last year in the Czech Republic, Canada beat Sweden 3-2 in overtime in the final for its fourth straight title.
Canada is trying to match its record of five straight titles, set from 1993-97.
"There's nothing else we want," said Tavares, the Oshawa star expected to be one of the top picks in the NHL draft. "There's nothing else we came here for."
Tokarski stopped Pavel Chernov on Russia's second shootout attempt to end the game. On Russia's first attempt, Dmitri Kurgryshev hit the post after Eberle scored.
"We knew what the goalie's tendency was and he has a tendency to go down," Eberle said. "Me and Johnny kind of did the same move, opposite hands."
Brett Sonne, Patrice Cormier and Angelo Esposito also scored in regulation, and Tokarski made 23 saves. Dmitri Klopov scored twice for Russia, and Maxim Goncharov, Evgeni Grachev and Sergei Andronov added goals. Vadim Zhelobnyuk made 36 saves.
"I don't believe it," Goncharov said. "It's very hard."
Klopov gave Russia the lead for the first time with 2:20 left in the third period, but with 19,327 fans at Scotiabank Place on their feet, Eberle tied it. Russian defenseman Dmitri Kulikov was on his knees in front of the net trying to freeze the puck, but Eberle stole it and scored on a backhander.
"That's the great thing about Canadians," Tavares said. "We don't quit and we fight right until the end, no matter what, and that little extra effort right at the end made the difference for us to tie the game and get into a shootout."
In the first semifinal, Mikael Backlund scored twice, and David Ullstrom, Simon Hjalmarsson and Oscar Moller added goals for Sweden in a comeback victory.
Tomas Tatar scored twice and Marek Mertel had a goal and two assists for Slovakia, a surprise semifinalist after a 5-3 quarterfinal win over the United States on Friday.
"We knew what we were doing - we knew Slovakia is a good team," Swedish defenseman Victor Hedman said. "They were up 2-1 before the last period, but we knew we were a stronger team than them and they had a tough game [Friday]."
Backlund tied it at 2 on a power-play at 7:04 of the third, Ullstrom gave Sweden the lead at 8:52, and Hjalmarsson made it 4-2 at 11:42.
"We were patient and worked hard the whole game," Backlund said. "We saw them play the American team and we knew if they got the first goal they would be hard to beat and they were hard to beat. I thought, `I don't want to go home now. I want to play in the final.' I was a little bit scared, so it feels good that we won the game."
The Slovaks pulled goalie Jaroslav Janus for an extra attacker with 4:30 left, and Tatar scored his second of the game with 4:02 to go.
Moller scored into an empty net with 1:17 left.
Janus made 47 saves, a night after stopping 44 U.S. shots.
"We could have won this game, but in the third period, we stopped playing for 5 minutes and they scored four goals," said Janus, who plays for the Erie Otters in the Ontario Hockey League. "It's pretty sad, but we have another game and hopefully we'll get a bronze medal. We played well, but when you lose, it's still a bad feeling."
The tournament has drawn a record 377,834 fans, breaking the mark of 374,353 set in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 2006.