If you love hockey, you have to love surprises too.

In 2019, IIHF fans were shocked when a no-name Finnish team won the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in Slovakia with consecutive playoff victories over stacked Swedish, Russian, and Canadian teams. This summer, the focus is on the NHL post-season, and the just-completed Stanley Cup qualifiers were full of dramatic and wacky events. (Best-of-five series may have contributed to the wackiness.)

Let’s explore what happened through the lens of international hockey fans.

Worlds MVPs an Endangered Species

Surprisingly, only three IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship MVPs will move on to compete in the first round, which kicks off on Tuesday. 

Patrick Kane (2018 MVP) of the Chicago Blackhawks (1+3=4) stepped up in his 12th-seeded team’s 3-1 series upset over the Edmonton Oilers. Ilya Kovalchuk (2009 MVP) of the Washington Capitals (0+1=1) and Mark Stone (2019 MVP) of the Vegas Golden Knights (2+3=5) were already guaranteed playoff berths as their teams played for seeding.

Eliminated MVPs included Pittsburgh’s Yevgeni Malkin (2012), Nashville’s Roman Josi (2013), Nashville’s Pekka Rinne (2014), Winnipeg’s Patrik Laine (2016), and Toronto’s William Nylander (2017).

Hard Times for Art Ross Trophy Winners

It’s headline news when forwards who have combined to win seven of the last 14 NHL scoring titles get knocked out of the post-season. Each is also a major star in international play.

Edmonton’s untimely exit means farewell to Art Ross Trophy winners Connor McDavid (2017, 2018), who led these qualifiers with nine points, and Leon Draisaitl (2020), whose league-best 110 points in the regular season puts him (422 career points) on pace to eclipse Marco Sturm (487 career points) as the all-time leading German NHL scorer next season.

Meanwhile, Pittsburgh Penguins legends Sidney Crosby (2007, 2014) and Yevgeni Malkin (2009, 2012) were eliminated in dismal fashion for the second consecutive year, this time versus the 12th-seeded Montreal Canadiens in four games. Malkin’s single assist made this his worst post-season statistically since going pointless in five games against the New York Rangers in 2015.

“Obviously, I would have liked to stay a little bit healthier and play a full season,” said Crosby, who turned 33 on Friday and was limited to 47 points in 41 regular season games. The two-time Olympic champion had three points (2+1=3) in the playoffs.

Remember the 2020 World Juniors?

Liam Foudy is having a special year.

In January, the London Knights co-captain won gold with Canada at the 2020 World Juniors in the Czech Republic (3+1=1). On Sunday, Foudy scored his first NHL goal as the Columbus Blue Jackets eliminated the Toronto Maple Leafs with a 3-0 Game Five win. This was the 20-year-old forward’s seventh career NHL game after appearing in two regular-season contests as an emergency call-up.

Other 2020 World Junior alumni who have seen ice time during this post-season include Arizona’s Barrett Hayton (Canada) and Toronto’s Nick Robertson (USA). Foudy and Robertson are the only two who have scored a goal so far.

Putting Toronto’s Drought Into Perspective

The Leafs have the NHL’s longest streak without a Stanley Cup, now sitting at 53 years. What does 1967 mean in an IIHF context?

To name just a few names, two-time IIHF world champion goalies Sean Burke (Canada) and Arturs Irbe (USSR, pre-Latvia) were born in 1967. So were defenders like 2018 Korean Olympic coach Jim Paek, a two-time Stanley Cup winner with Pittsburgh, and Geraldine Heaney, a 2008 IIHF Hall of Fame inductee who captured an Olympic gold medal and seven Women’s Worlds with Canada. 

Toronto’s last Stanley Cup came 34 days after the Soviet Union wrapped up its fifth consecutive World Championship gold medal with a 4-2 win over Czechoslovakia in Vienna, Austria on 29 March 1967. Canada’s Carl Brewer provided a Leafs connection. The veteran defenceman helped Toronto win its previous three Cups (1962-64) before earning bronze with Canada in 1967, despite suffering an elbow to the eye by USSR forward Viktor Polupanov.

Korpisalo Joins Some Elite Company

In a bizarre house-of-mirrors sequence, Finland’s Joonas Korpisalo lost the Columbus net to Latvia’s Elvis Merzlikins after spotting Toronto a 3-0 lead in Game Three of the qualifiers – before the Jackets rallied to win 4-3 in overtime. But after Merzlikins gave up four straight goals in Toronto’s 4-3 overtime comeback victory in Game Four, Jackets coach John Tortorella went back to Korpisalo for the deciding game.

The 26-year-old Pori native, who posted a 28-save shutout in the opening 2-0 win, frustrated Toronto with a 33-save shutout in the closing 3-0 win.

The upshot? Korpisalo is now one of just eight NHL goalies ever to record two shutouts in a best-of-five series. The NHL last used a best-of-five format since 1986. Buffalo’s Bob Sauve (1983) is the only other netminder to achieve the feat since the 1920s and 30s.

“I’m so proud of him,” Columbus captain Nick Foligno said of Korpisalo, a 2013 World Junior and 2017 Worlds participant. “With the way the series went, for him to come in and pitch a shutout like that for us, he’s such a good goalie. He kept us calm in some situations and is a big reason why we got the win.”

Nationality-wise, Korpisalo is also one of just five Finnish goalies to get two goose eggs in a playoff series. He joins Calgary’s Miikka Kiprusoff (2004 vs. Detroit), Chicago’s Antti Niemi (2010 vs. Chicago), Boston’s Tuukka Rask (2013 vs. Pittsburgh), and Nashville’s Pekka Rinne (2017 vs. Chicago).

Triple Gold Club Odds Diminish

After the Stanley Cup qualifiers, there are only two potential Triple Gold Club members left for 2020: Kovalchuk and Shea Weber of the Montreal Canadiens.

It’s possible that three of the eliminated candidates have played their final NHL games, with Father Time taking his toll on these Olympians.

Dan Hamhuis, 37, did not suit up for the Nashville Predators during their 3-1 series loss to Arizona, and the 2014 Olympic gold medalist with Canada is bound for unrestricted free agency. Pittsburgh’s Patrick Marleau, who won Olympic gold in 2010 and 2014 and is the active NHL games leader (1,723), is also unsigned for next season at age 40. And Henrik Lundqvist of the New York Rangers, who backstopped Sweden to Olympic gold in 2014, has one year left on his seven-year, $59,500,000 contract, but may according to rumours opt to retire at age 38. 

From 2019 Worlds to 2020 NHL Playoffs, By the Numbers

Through the qualifiers, Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl, Chicago’s Dominik Kubalik, and Vancouver’s Quinn Hughes were the leading scorers (6 points apiece) among players who participated in the 2019 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship.

Players who participated in the 2019 Worlds scored 44 of the 235 total goals in the qualifiers. That’s 18.7 percent.

Three members of the 2019 tournament all-star team are still in the hunt for the Stanley Cup: goalie Andrei Vasilevski (Tampa Bay) and forwards Mark Stone (Vegas) and Jakub Voracek (Philadelphia).

The NHL season continues with the following pairings: