YARMOUTH, N.S. – Ryan Fitzgerald scored a hat trick in the first period and Zach Stepan had two goals of his own as the United States routed Canada East 9-1 in the World Junior A Challenge opener for both on Monday night.
Fitzgerald scored at 2:24, 9:06 and 19:50 of the first to help the Americans to their largest victory ever at the World Junior A Challenge. The eight-goal defeat matched the worst ever by Canada East – it fell to Canada West in the 2009 semifinals by an identical score.
Taylor Cammarata, Vince Hinostroza, Dan Molenaar and Justin Woods had the other goals for the U.S., which got points from 11 different players in the victory.
Molenaar’s goal, scored just seven seconds into the third period, set a tournament record for fastest goal to start a period, bettering the 10 seconds it took American forward Sam Warning to score in a 2009 game against Sweden.
Shane Conacher (Burlington, Ont./Burlington, OJHL) scored the lone goal for Canada East, which came out on the wrong end of a 43-27 shot clock, including 31-11 in the first two periods.
Charlie Finn (North Vancouver, B.C./Kingston, OJHL) got the start in the Canada East goal, allowing four goals on 13 shots before giving way to Daniel Mannella (Woodbridge, Ont./Georgetown, OJHL) to begin the second period. Eamon McAdam made 26 saves to pick up the win for the U.S.
The Americans are right back to action Tuesday night, taking on Switzerland at the Mariners Centre (7:30 p.m. AT), while Canada East will have a day to regroup before facing the Swiss on Wednesday night (7:30 p.m. AT).
-Hockey Canada