A tournament of the best on best kicked off Wednesday night, with Canada and Sweden getting the first match. Although fans have been apprehensive about this mini-tournament since it was announced, any negative feelings were swiftly put to bed as the first match was electric and delivered on the promise of best-on-best play. Featuring new overtime rules, dazzling players, and national pride, two of Florida’s best players were on the ice: Sam Reinhart (CAN) and Gustav Forsling (SE). Both players made impact plays for their respective teams and had a great opening game.
Sam Reinhart:
Honored with a top-line role for Team Canada, Reinhart had two highlight plays in the first match but not in what fans would typically expect. A huge defensive play in the first period had Reinhart lying out on the ice to disrupt a cross-ice pass from Sweden that would’ve set up a dangerous scoring chance. The effort earned him stick taps and cheers from his Canadian teammates, as well as praise from the TV commentators. In the second period, Sam once again put his body on the line by blocking a big one-timer shot from the Swedes. As expected, Reinhart was hard on forechecking all night, and Canada was running him in the slot on the top power-play unit where he lives on the Florida power-play. Fans didn’t get a chance to see much of the power-play as Team Canada only got one, but they made the most of it as with 12 seconds gone, they scored on a cross-ice feed from Crosby to MacKinnon. Reinhart was heavily covered in the slot which isn’t surprising given how much damage he did on the power-play last season from that area of the ice, but there’s also likely little opponents can do against that Canadian power-play given the personnel. Sam logged three shots on goal, which was tied for second-most on the team with Mark Stone, while MacKinnon had 6 SOG to lead Team Canada. Reinhart also logged the fourth most TOI of the forwards at 18:55, he didn’t see much extra time when the game went into OT where Canada emerged victorious after Sweden came back from a 3-1 deficit to tie the game in the third period. It was a great first game from Reinhart and he made the defensive plays that gave his team some extra momentum.
Gustav Forsling:
Forsling is no stranger to tough assignments during the regular season, and this game was no different. He was most often deployed against the Reinhart-McDavid-Marner line or the Crosby-MacKinnon-Stone line. Forsling did Forsling things and had the speed to match the quick transition from Canada to get good coverage on the puck carriers trying to enter the zone. More than once he was sat in front of the net and was boxing out his Panther teammate Reinhart to give Gustavsson the best chance to make a save. When his team was struggling in the first period Forsling took it upon himself to try and generate some offense as he took the team’s first SOG over 15 minutes into the period. It seemed like he took more shots in this one game than he has in any game for the Panthers all season, and that’s fine the Cats don’t necessarily need him to generate offense when he’s on the ice. He made one great pass to his teammate that set up a dangerous scoring chance on a one-timer shot. Despite Stone scoring the goal in the second period, Forsling did his job and was all over Sydney Crosby, forcing him wide of the net and denying a shot chance for him. However, unfortunately, his teammates near Stone didn’t mark him and Crosby’s pass got through where it ended up in the back of the net. It felt like Gus was on the ice for nearly half the game, which he was since he logged 24:58 TOI, second only to Hedman, who had 27:15. Forsling made some great poke checks and cleaned up loose pucks at the front of the net. The most important time he did that was following an incredible save by Gustavsson to rob Canada of goal. Gus then cleared the puck that had gotten loose, and Sweden got some good momentum back. Forsling earned himself a spot on the second penalty-kill unit, although there wasn’t much time for him to showcase his skills against the back-breaking Canada power-play unit. As expected, Forsling did what he did best and covered star players to make their nights more difficult.
ITR 43: It's Winning Time – Inside The Rink
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