Islanders Bits: Isles Set for IIHF Worlds Clash; Mama Tavares a Fan

Duhatschek says the Flames should make a pitch.

The United States made like Canada and destroyed defending champion Finland at the IIHF World Championship with a 5-0 win. The victory clinches a quarterfinal birth for the U.S. and featured an absolutely vicious check from behind by Anssi Salmela on Alex Goligoski that was bad enough to make an owner rethink his involvement with the game.

Meanwhile, Switzerland is on the brink of missing the quarterfinals and their Tuesday match against USA is critical. For Islanders watchers, Mark Streit is visibly frustrated with their mistakes and Nino Niederreiter's ice time has dropped as the tourney has progressed. (More observations in this comment thread here. Discussion of Nino from Duhatschek and Mirtle with 2:30 left in this podcast.)

Other Islanders-related links of interest:

Great profile of John Tavares and particularly his mother, who is an avid traveling fan of Team Canada. | Tavares thanks fans for the EA cover vote campaign.
An attempt to re-look at shot blocks with better context; Andrew MacDonald on the list.
Fun 1-on-1 with Matt Martin from The Checking Line.
Interesting this-and-that on the Islanders' policy of (mostly) closed practices.
Ryan Strome shut down in the final series for the second straight year, a sign he needs further pre-NHL development? [Also, more musing on Kabanov]
NEW (but not) Coliseum update: Lather, rinse, repeat. [FanShot] [7th Woman]

General Hockey:

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