Russia and USA most recently played at the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in 2017.
photo: Andre Ringuette / HHOF-IIHF Images
The Preliminary Round ended with exciting games and the quarter-final pairings known. The 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship will continue with four interesting games on Thursday.
After a day off the top-two teams of each group will play their games at the venue they have called home for the last two weeks while the other teams travel tomorrow.
The day will start with a classic Russia-USA rivalry in the afternoon in Bratislava while Canada and Switzerland will play a rematch of last year’s semi-final where Switzerland upset Canada 3-2.
After the cross-Atlantic clashes in the afternoon, two neighbouring rivalries will be up in the evening. In Bratislava the Czech Republic, which has been something like the de-facto home team in Bratislava, will play Germany while the classic Nordic clash Finland-Sweden will be the late game in Kosice.
Click here for tickets for the final round.
After a day off the top-two teams of each group will play their games at the venue they have called home for the last two weeks while the other teams travel tomorrow.
The day will start with a classic Russia-USA rivalry in the afternoon in Bratislava while Canada and Switzerland will play a rematch of last year’s semi-final where Switzerland upset Canada 3-2.
After the cross-Atlantic clashes in the afternoon, two neighbouring rivalries will be up in the evening. In Bratislava the Czech Republic, which has been something like the de-facto home team in Bratislava, will play Germany while the classic Nordic clash Finland-Sweden will be the late game in Kosice.
Click here for tickets for the final round.
Quarter-Finals on 23 May
In Bratislava:Russia vs. USA 16:15
Czech Republic vs. Germany 20:15
In Kosice:
Canada vs. Switzerland 16:15
Finland vs. Sweden 20:15
Semi-Finals on 25 May
Note that this is the first IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship where the semi-final pairings will not be determined in classic brackets but according to the seeding after the preliminary round. The top-seeded semi-finalist will play the bottom-seeded semi-finalist at 15:15, and the second-seeded semi-finalist will play the third-seeded semi-finalist at 19:15. Both games as well as the medal games on 26 May will be held in Bratislava.Seeding order:
1) Russia (1st Group B, 21 points)
2) Canada (1st Group A, 18 points)
3) Czech Republic (2nd Group B, 18 points)
4) Finland (2nd Group A, 16 points)
5) Sweden (3rd Group B, 15 points)
6) Germany (3rd Group B, 15 points)
7) USA (4th Group A, 14 points)
8) Switzerland (4th Group B, 12 points)
Final Ranking 9-16
9) Slovakia10) Latvia
11) Denmark
12) Norway
13) Great Britain
14) Italy
15) France
16) Austria
France and Austria are relegated and will be replaced by Kazakhstan and Belarus in the 2020 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship.