Olympics Hockey Betting: Canada vs. Slovakia
 Canada |
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 Slovakia |
The semifinals of the Olympic Ice Hockey tournament wrap up on Friday night in Vancouver, where the host nation, Team Canada, will take on the red hot Slovaks. After a dismal effort in the group stage of this tournament, the Canadians have fired back with back-to-back very impressive victories in the knockout rounds. As expected, they pummeled Germany 8-2 in the qualification stage, but in a complete surprise, they absolutely mauled Russia 7-3 in a game that was never close from the start. Slovakia has gotten to this stage the hard way as well. The Slovaks bounced both Norway and Sweden by identical 4-3 score lines.
If the Canadians don’t win gold in their own backyard, they certainly don’t have their offense to blame. The unit has been on fire, easily scoring the most goals of any team in the tournament (29). Unlike any other team, Canada can say that all 20 of its forwards and defensemen have scored at least one point. F Corey Perry is the only man to not have an assist coming into the semifinals. F Jerome Iginla leads the squad with five goals even though he has bounced around from line to line. In replacing the benched G Martin Brodeur, Vancouver’s own G Roberto Luongo hasn’t been much to write home about either. He conceded three goals against the Russian in two meaningful periods of hockey, and if not for the fact that his counterpart in that game, G Evgeni Nabokov was miserable, the Canadians may not still be playing tonight.
Though the odds are clearly stacked against them, the Slovaks aren’t a team to count out. G Jaroslav Halak has been fantastic in this tournament, posting a 1.97 GAA and a .923 save percentage. There are plenty of NHL names on this roster as well, and even though these guys aren’t up to the skill level of the mighty Canadians, players like Marian Gaborik, Martin Cibak, Miroslav Satan, Richard Zednik, Ziggy Palffy, Pavol Demitra, Marcel Hossa, Andrej Meszaros, and Zdeno Chara certainly aren’t going to be intimidated. This is a team that already has beaten Russia as well in this tournament, so it has the ability to pull off upsets.
At this point though, the Canadians just look like an engine that cannot be stopped. The weight of the entire country is on this team’s shoulders, and it just feels like a 2.5-goal spread isn’t going to stop them. Anything less than four goals for an offense which has averaged nearly six per game would be surprising. The question is whether Slovakia has the ability of scoring 2-3 or not. We think not.
Selection: Canada
You can find the Canadians lined at -2.5 (-120) right now at Bookmaker Sportsbook!
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