Canada stormed out to a 5-0 lead after the first period and skated to a dominant 7-1 win over Slovakia in the last quarter-finals match of the day.

The win gives Canada a semi-finals date with Czechia on Sunday, a re-match of the first game on Boxing Day, a messy 7-5 win for Canada. Sweden and Finland will play in the other match that day. Some 14 players registered a point tonight, and there were seven different scorers.

Canada's all-time record against Slovakia in World Junior play improves to 17-1-0 with tonight's win. The only tie, 0-0, occurred back on December 27, 1998.

"We had a game plan and we stuck to it, and I think that's why we were able to get that big lead," said Canada's Cole Reschny. "Hockey is a game of momentum. We got one and then another, and we kept going and going and didn't let up at all."

"They scored that first goal and our whole bench went down, and then they scored a second and third, and it was too late to do anything," lamented Slovakia captain Tobias Pitka. "We came into this game like it was any other game, but it didn't end like we wanted. We have to move on, but I wish the best of luck for next year's team and the younger guys who come here."

Slovakia didn’t register a shot until halfway through the first period, but it wasn’t until after this that Canada opened the floodgates. It all started at 13:58 when goalie Michal Pradel couldn’t handle a Keaton Verhoeff shot. Reschny was right there to knock in the loose puck.

Just 44 seconds later, Canada struck again. Tij Iginla wired a shot from the left wing with Pradel deep in his net, giving Jarome’s son plenty of net to work with. Fast forward another minute and a half, and Michael Misa beat Pradel with a low shot through traffic.

That was enough for Czechia coach Peter Fruhauf, who pulled Pradel in favour of Alan Lendak. Unfortunately, the move didn’t affect Canada at all, as they scored on their first shot on the new ‘tender. This time, it was Sam O’Reilly with a close-in chance that he converted.

Then, in the dying seconds, Canada scored on the power play with 12.9 seconds remaining. The players whipped the puck around with impressive speed, and in the end Gavin McKenna found Brady Martin at the back door to make it an even 5-0 as a shell-shocked Slovakian team hurried to the dressing room to re-group.

The best player in the second was unquestionably Lendak. He was besieged by sensational scoring chances but yielded only two goals. He stoned Jett Luchanko on an early breakaway and denied Iginla twice on grade A chances. But he couldn’t stop everything of quality.

Porter Martone took a sweet little pass coming over the blue line from Verhoeff and went in alone, beating Lendak between the pads at 9:31. Just 70 seconds later, the goalie stopped O’Reilly from the doorstep, but Cole Beaudoin was there to knock in the rebound.

The Canadians took their foot off the gas briefly, and Slovakia sensed as much, producing their best couple of minutes of the game. They got some measure of satisfaction by breaking Jack Ivankovic’s shutout. Jan Chovan snapped a high shot from the slot at 16:50 to make it a 7-1 game.

The third was placid and uneventful, Canada happy to let the clock tick down, Slovakia unable to mount any sort of charge.