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World Juniors Day 3 Recap: Zeev Buium stellar as Team USA overcomes plucky Latvians
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Photo credit: Stephen R. Sylvanie-USA TODAY Sports
Mike Gould
Dec 28, 2024, 19:30 EST
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It was the Zeev Buium show on Saturday as Team USA defeated Team Latvia by a 5-1 score at the 2025 IIHF World Junior Championship.
The Minnesota Wild prospect scored his first goal of the tournament and logged a team-high 23:53 of ice time as the Americans improved to a perfect 2-0-0-0 in the preliminary round. He also finished with a plus-two rating.
Buium, the No. 12 overall pick in the 2024 NHL Draft, helped Team USA overcome a Latvian squad that shocked the sports world on Friday night by beating Team Canada 3-2 in a shootout. Although the Latvians held Team USA to 41 shots on Saturday while mustering 26 of their own, they fell behind just 1:58 into regulation and never recovered.
Danny Nelson (NYI) scored twice, including the opening goal, while American captain Ryan Leonard (WSH) tacked on the winning goal early in the second period. Max Plante (DET) also found the back of the net for Team USA, while Davids Livsics (und.) netted the only goal for the opposition.
Team Latvia took full advantage of Canada’s stagnant power play and spotty defensive group to win in a shocker on Friday, and it looked like they might be back at it on Saturday when they outshot the Americans 8-7 in the opening frame. But Team USA fully took over from there, controlling the shots 34-18 over the final 40 minutes and pulling away on the scoreboard.
Potential first-overall pick in the making James Hagens (2025) also had a strong game for the Americans, assisting on the Leonard and Buium goals just over six minutes apart in the second period. Team USA’s top line of Hagens, Leonard, and Gabe Perreault (NYR) continues to be the best in the tournament and should give Team Canada fits when the two teams go at it on New Years’ Eve.

Best of the rest

  • There was just one other game on Saturday, and it was a laugher. This should just about sum it up: Team Kazakhstan forward Kirill Lyapunov (und.) scored one of his team’s two goals and still finished with a minus-six rating. Jakub Stancl (STL), Vojtech Hradec (UTA), and Matej Mastalirsky (und.) all recorded hat tricks, with the first two adding a pair of assists each, as Team Czechia cruised to a 14-2 victory at TD Place in Ottawa. The Czechs only needed 36 shots to score their 14 goals — that’s a 38.9 conversion rate! — and remain tied with the Swedes at the top of the table in Group B with a perfect 2-0-0-0 record.

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