News

Because it took place during the NHL playoffs in a remote part of Russia, not a lot of North American fans saw Canada's 8-0 demolition of the host country in the gold medal game of the world under-18 hockey championships last April.

But the Russians haven't forgotten the humiliation.

His equipment had not yet been shed after a 5-1 victory over the Czech Republic in a world junior championship semi-final on Friday when centre Evgeni Grachev mentioned the Creaming in Kazan and said that Mother Russia owed Canada some payback.

Meanwhile, five players on Canada's world junior team, and head coach Pat Quinn, helped author the annihilation, and most admit that it was one of those games where the stars aligned and where everything turned up maple leafs. (The margin was particularly shocking given that Russia had beaten Canada 4-2 earlier in the tournament).

"We had everything going for us that game," said Canadian centre Cody Hodgson, who played at the under-18s.

"We got a few goals on them early and we just kept going," added forward Jordan Eberle, another member of both Canadian teams. "We just kept hitting them and they seemed to shutdown."

On Saturday, the Canadians expect a much tougher test when the most historic rivalry in hockey renews in a world junior semi-final. The winner will play in the gold medal game on Monday night. The loser plays for bronze.

"It's pretty much the same as most Russian teams," Hodgson said. "They're big, they're skilled, they're fast up front. They take off."

But in preparation for the game, Eberle noticed a couple of differences with this Russian squad.

"The biggest thing that stuck out to me, having played Russia in the past, is that they've always been kind of skilled with turn backs and stuff like that," he said. "But it seems like they're chipping the puck in a lot more and are a lot more physical."

Grachev, Nikita Filatov, Pavel Chernov, Dmitry Kugryshev and others all participated in the one-sided contest on home turf last spring and are here in Ottawa with vivid memories. Head coach Sergei Nemchinov said his team needs its best game to date to beat Canada.

Russia also needs stable goaltending. That was a huge problem area in a 5-0 loss to Sweden in the final game of the preliminary round. But Vadim Zhelobnyuk bounced back and allowed only one goal in the semi-final victory — although he really wasn't tested by the defensive Czechs.

It is also not the typical Russian team because it is not a favourite — or co-favourite with Canada — at this tournament. Many observers believed that Canada, Sweden and the U.S. were superior teams on paper to Russia, which seemed to have less firepower than teams of the past.

In fact, only seven of their 12 forwards have scored goals at this tournament, and if you throw out Filatov's six tallies, Russia only has 11 goals from its forwards.

But that doesn't have the Canadians finding false comfort.

"They're always scary," centre Patrice Cormier said. "With their speed, they can be very scary."