Elias Pettersson is one of the leading scorers at the 2018 World Junior Championship, with four goals and six points in four games. Only Buffalo Sabres prospect Casey Mittelstadt of Team USA has more points, though Pettersson is tied with nine other players at six points, including his Swedish teammates Alex Nylander, Lias Andersson, and Rasmus Dahlin.
Despite his strong start to the tournament, Pettersson has looked frustrated on the ice, at times even exasperated. Most of the exasperation has been with himself, looking skyward when he’s shanked a one-timer off the target or had a puck hop over his stick. Pettersson clearly expects a lot more out of himself.
“I always have high expectations of me,” he said after Saturday’s game against Switzerland. “On the power play, we’re playing really well. I feel I’m not – me and our line – creating chances as I want on five-on-five.”
It’s an accurate description of his play so far in the tournament. The Swedish power play, with Pettersson at the right faceoff circle on the first unit, has looked dangerous all tournament, even if it ran dry against Russia in their final game in group play. Even with a two-minute long 5-on-3 and five total power play opportunities, Sweden couldn’t get a much-needed goal with the man advantage.
Heading into that game, however, the Swedish power play was 5-for-15, with Pettersson providing two of those goals. Both power play goals have come via his wrist shot, rather than the one-timer that he’s used to deadly effect in the Swedish Hockey League this season.
Pettersson’s other two goals came at even-strength in the third period against Switzerland, where he’s come the closest to the dominance he desired heading into the tournament. His first goal was on its way to an assist before it deflected off a Swiss stick and went into the net, but his second goal was simply a thing of beauty.
It was one of the best goals of the tournament: Pettersson came flying down the right wing, froze the defender with a fake shot, pulled the puck around him, then cut to the front of the net and tucking the puck around the goaltender while flying through the air.
.@Canucks prospect Elias Pettersson comes down the wing and makes a ridiculous move before diving across the crease to finish it off in style for Team Sweden (@Trekronorse).#WorldJuniors #TSNHockey pic.twitter.com/koB4KOcThM
— TSN (@TSN_Sports) December 30, 2017
According to Pettersson, the toe-drag around Simon le Coultre wasn’t planned, but a reaction to what he saw from the defenceman, making it even more impressive.
“I got a pass from Lias,” he said. “First, I thought I was going to take a shot, but I saw the defender react to that. I fake him out and stickhandle [and make] my go-to move on the goalie.”
The move he used was indeed a variation of his go-to move that he generally defaults to during shootouts and on breakaways. When Pettersson called it his “go-to move” during Canucks development camp, Manny Malhotra could only laugh in disbelief. Seeing him pull off the same move in tight and with pressure from defenders is simply unreal.
The one caveat is that the goal came against Switzerland, a team that barely avoided the relegation round by beating Belarus 3-2.
Pettersson had two points against Belarus and three points against Switzerland, the two weakest teams in Group B. Against the Czech Republic and Russia, he had just the one point, a goal against the Czechs, though that goal was lovely — a bullet of a wrist shot from the left faceoff circle that went off the crossbar and in.
That’s not entirely unusual: most tournament-leading scorers pad their totals against the weak teams in the round robin stage. And that’s certainly not to say that Pettersson played poorly against Russia, even as he got held off the scoresheet.
Pettersson nearly scored on a breakaway in that game, but got can-opener’d by Dmitri Somorukov: he got his stick in between Pettersson’s legs and twisted him down to the ice. Somehow, the referees chose to call a two-minute minor instead of the penalty shot he deserved.
#Canucks Elias Pettersson with the break - hooking penalty called and Pettersson misses high pic.twitter.com/ice9CNPJpw
— Ryan Biech (@ryanbiech) January 1, 2018
Pettersson has drawn several penalties with his ability to quickly change speed and direction, but he had a clear breakaway before getting hauled down.
He nearly had a goal in the third period when a shot deflected off him as he battled in front of the net, but it was cleared off the line by a Russian defender. Later in the period, he set up Sabres prospect Alex Nylander in front with a great pass out of the corner for what could have been the game-winner, but Nylander hit the post on the backhand.
In the shootout, Pettersson should have gone with his go-to move, but chose to shoot instead, missing the net. Fortunately, it didn't matter as Sweden still won in the shootout.
“I want to dominate every game,” he said before the tournament, and he hasn’t quite managed that just yet.
“That’s what I want to do. I’m not saying that I’m going to do that every game,” Pettersson said on Saturday. “That’s what I want to do. But not yet.”
One reason why Pettersson has yet to dominate is that he’s playing on the wing rather than at centre, naturally moving him to the periphery in both the defensive and offensive zones. In addition, he has played the bulk of the tournament with Nylander, a player who loves to carry the puck, leaving Pettersson with fewer opportunities to control the pace of play and create chances for his teammates.
That’s not a bad thing, really. Nylander is a very good player, who led Sweden in scoring at last year’s tournament. Getting balanced scoring from the Swedish lineup will be essential as Sweden heads into the knockout round. They loaded up the top line with Pettersson, Andersson, and Nylander against Russia and it made Sweden a little too easy to shut down.
Pettersson will get more chances to dominate, starting with Sweden’s quarterfinal matchup against Slovakia, who surprised Team USA in the round robin with a 3-2 win. Slovak goaltender Roman Durny has arguably been the best goalie in the tournament, keeping Slovakia in games where they’ve been badly out-shot with his .930 save percentage.
Slovakia is likely to be badly out-shot again. Sweden leads the tournament in shots on goal with 156, while Slovakia has 111, with 40 of them coming from their game against Denmark. The game will likely come down to one thing: will Pettersson and the rest of Sweden be able to solve Durny?
Odds are that they will, but Slovakia’s win over Team USA means that Sweden can’t take them lightly. If Pettersson can dominate the way he feels like he can, it shouldn’t be an issue.
