Quarter Finals - Russia-USA, Canada-Switzerland -Jan 2, 2014

This morning we slept in until 7:30, got showered, and basically took our time in the room.  I looked at my watch and it indicated about 9:45 am, so we decided to go for breakfast.  Then I looked at our itinerary and saw that our bus was to leave at 10:30, rather than the usual noon..  Panic set in as we needed to get breakfast before leaving for the arena.  We hustled down, dished up a small portion and ate.  Then I looked at my watch and and it showed about 9:15, so clearly I had read it wrong the first time.  Now we had lots of time to get ourselves ready.

The USA-Russia game was the first one, so we got to the arena about an hour before the game started. After sitting in the lobby, we went in to find the seats we like to sit in - lots more people were coming in, so we weren't sure if we would be able to sit there, or not. It turned out that we only had to move over one seat because a couple ladies had the seat numbers we had chosen.

The game started, and Russia scored first. Then the Americans scored a couple goals to lead 2-1. The Russians tied it up. Then the Americans went ahead 3-2. In the 2nd period, they were back and forth. The Russians picked up their play and were really pressing. With about 6 minutes left in the period, the Americans took a penalty, and then shortly after that, another. Down 5 skaters to 3, the Russians scored to let one penalty expire. Then they took another penalty for shooting the puck over the boards, and the Russians scored again, to lead 4-3.

They went through the third period holding onto that lead. With 1:40 left in the period, the US pulled their goalie to try to get the equalizer. The American defenceman had the puck with a Russian attacking him. He fell down, and the Russian scored into an empty net to win the game 5-3. A real downer for the US, but very exciting for the Russians. They saluted the crowd for their support in the game, before leaving the ice.

Then we went to the Fan Zone to watch the Finland-Czech game on the big screen. We stayed until the end of the second period with the Czechs leading 3-2. With the Canadian game coming up, we wanted to watch the warm-up, so went back into the arena. Later, we found out that Finland had come back to beat the Czech team, 4-3.

Warm-up with Canada and Switzerland was good. For the 4th game in a row, Canada was wearing their red uniforms and shooting twice at the end we were sitting. This game had more people at it, and the seats we had chosen remained empty, so we thought we were in luck. Another group of young guys with no shirts and CANADA spelled on their chests, chose the seats in front of us, but they were pretty much harmless. It was a good start with Canada scoring first.

In the 2nd period, a young couple who had been in Copenhagen and experienced trouble with the train arrived.  Of course, we were in their seats.  We moved, and the ladies who had come in earlier, offered to move down a couple seats so we could stay there.  A Canadian player, after getting taken down on a breakaway, was awarded a penalty shot. He scored on that to lead 2-0. With 1 second left in the second, the Swiss team scored a goal that had to be looked at for quite a while to ensure it wasn't tipped with a high stick. It was allowed, so that was the way the period ended.

Then in the 3rd, we scored another to take the game handily. The Swiss were tenacious and hard checking. They were very quick, and gave the bigger Canadian team some hard checks. It was a good game, but the outcome was the important part.

After that, it was back to our hotel to get ready for the early trip to Stockholm in the morning. We had to make sure we had things figured out for packing, because we were leaving early for the airport.