Russia defeats Czech Republic 4-2, gains quarterfinal bye ~ Azaa's Weblog

VANCOUVER — An earlier shootout loss to Slovakia turned out to be just a blip for the Russians as they downed the Czech Republic 4-2 to earn one of the quarterfinal byes in the men's Olympic hockey tournament.

Based on two regulation wins and one overtime loss, the Russians finish pool play with seven points and a plus-seven goal differential.

They will have to await the results of Sunday's Canada-USA and Sweden-Finland games to know their seeding. The top four teams in pool play gain byes into the quarterfinals, with the remaining teams playing wild card games to make the quarterfinals.

SUMMARY: Russia 4, Czech Republic 2

Malkin scored a pair of goals for the Russians, with his second coming early in the third period after Russian star Alex Ovechkin decked Czech star Jaromir Jagr with a crushing shoulder to the head. Jagr lost the puck, and moments later Malkin scored what ended up being Russia's winning goal.

Russia had a 3-1 lead at that point, but Milan Michalek scored with 5:09 lett in the third period to make it a one-goal game. Jagr was in front, possibly screening goalie Evgeni Nabokov..

At 15:13 of the first period, Malkin had scored a power-play goal to give Russia a 1-0 lead. He threaded a puck past Czech goalie Tomas Vokoun from the right wing circle.

Back-to-back penalties to KHL defenseman Konstantin Korneyev and former NHL player Sergei Fedorov led to a 5-on-3 power play goal by Tomas Plekanec to tie the game 1-1.

Russia had a chance to clear the puck out of the zone, but Pavel Datsyuk couldn't bat it out of the air. After it landed, Patrick Elias flipped it forward to Plekanec, who roofed a shot into the far corner.

The Russians went ahead 14:34 in the second period when Viktor Kozlov scored. Datsyuk added an empty-netter with 12.3 seconds left in regulation.