Sweden takes home the gold in inline hockey

Just thought I would do a follow-up on my post about the Inline Hockey World Championship as the final took place today.

The final was played between Sweden and Slovakia. Sweden had advanced to final by beating Finland in the quarterfinal (9-3) and USA in the semi (12-8), while Slovakia got there by wins against Czech Republic (6-5 in OT) and Germany (3-2 in OT).

Sweden, which was the defending Champion and had already beaten Slovakia 5-0 earlier in the tournament, was obviously the favorite. They stood up to the pressure and took home the gold after a comfortable 7-3 win. Yay!

Sweden's top scorer was Detroit prospect Dick Axelsson, who had 9 goals and 7 assists in 6 games. He ended up second in points in the tournament behind college hockey player Pat Lee, who had 8 goals and 10 assists in 6 games. Lee couldn't help his USA to a medal though as they lost to Germany, 7-8, in the bronze game.

Directorate Awards:

Best Goalkeeper - Sasu Hovi (FIN)
Best Defenseman - Lee Sweatt (USA)
Best Forward - Linus Klasen (SWE)
MVP - Dick Axelsson (SWE)

Other players from the tournament you might have heard of:

Ales Hemsky, Czech Republic
Karel Rachunek, Czech Republic
Petr Tenkrat, Czech Republic
Lubomir Visnovsky, Slovakia

For full stats from the tournament, check here. Oh and congrats to the Swedish players!

What do Swedish hockey players do in the summer?

They play inline hockey! OK, far from all of them. Golf and harness racing seem to be the most common interest.

The Inline Hockey World Championship is played during the summers though and it's always fun to see which players are on the Swedish national team. Reason is because there are usually a couple of names that I as a hockey fan recognize.

Last year, 2-time Swedish Champion Per Ledin, who I mentioned before has signed with the Colorado Avalanche, was on the squad. That team ended up going all the way and won the gold.

This year you will find for example Detroit prospect Dick Axelsson, puck wizard and fellow SEL player Linus Klasen and Fredrik Eriksson, who scored the Swedish Championship winning goal in 2006.

The tournament starts on June 21. You find the official site here and Sweden's squad can be found here (PDF-file).
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Dick Axelsson on loan to Sweden

21-year-old forward Dick Axelsson was picked up late in the second round of the 2006 NHL Draft by the Detroit Red Wings. He just comes off a great rookie season in the SEL, where he had 12 goals and 13 assists in 47 games and also got to play on the national team.

Detroit thought he had showed enough and signed him to a contract about a month ago. Not that surprising though, it became official yesterday that he will go back to Sweden and Djurgårdens IF on loan for one season.

- We're hoping that he will continue developing this upcoming season. He showed really good results in his rookie season and got every possibility to take the next step in his development, says Djurgården's GM Janne Järlefelt.

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