Medal Round Begins in Vancouver

photo credit: Jeff Vinnick, Hockey Canada

The eight teams that were not good enough during group play to earn a bye into the quarterfinals take the Vancouver ice Tuesday for spots along the US, Sweden, Russia and Finland.

(6) Canada vs. (11) Germany 7:30pm ET (winner plays Russia)

Marco Sturm, Christian Ehrhoff and company have the unenviable task of facing the Canadians 48 hours after being upended by the Americans. Steve Yzerman and Mike Babcock are switching to Roberto Luongo in net after Martin Brodeur’s shaky outing Sunday night. The Canuck will look sharp against an offensively-challenged German squad, but feel bad for goalie Thomas Greiss. The Canadian snipers won’t be too kind to him. The host country could win this one by five goals.

(5) Czech Repubic vs. (12) Latvia 10:00pm ET (winner plays Finland)

This is as close to a bye as you can get without actually staying in bed for the day. The Czechs need to take advantage of this matchup with Finland waiting in the quarterfinals, especially on offense. Jaromir Jagr, David Krejci, Martin Havlat and Tomas Fleischmann must find their strokes if this team is to make a gold medal run.

(7) Slovakia vs. (10) Norway 12:00am ET (winner plays Sweden)

Slovakia owns one of the more impressive wins of the preliminary round (2-1 over Russia), but is our pick to be upset Tuesday – if for no other reason than Norway has a player named Vikingstad (Tore, who scored a hat trick over the weekend against Switzerland).

(8) Switzerland vs. (8) Belarus 3:00pm ET (winner plays USA)

Goaltender Jonas Hiller is the best player on either side, which gives Switzerland the advantage in this one. He nearly stole one from Canada last week, so keeping a Kostitsyn or two in check should be no problem.

MONDAY’S SCORES – Women’s Semifinals

USA 9 – Sweden 1

Canada 5 – Finland 0

final is Thursday at 6:30pm ET

America Was Watching Sunday Night

Hockey fans know where MSNBC is on their TVs. The USA-Canada clash averaged 8.22 million viewers, the 2^nd-highest rated program in the network’s history. Only 2008 Election Night coverage was better, and only by roughly 10,000 viewers. And in Buffalo, where they love Ryan Miller, more people watched this game than the regular Olympic coverage on NBC.

- Andrew Bogusch (boguschhockey@gmail.com)