GDT: Group B - May 12 - Latvia vs Switzerland

[stv11]

2019 IIHF World Championship
Group B

May 12
2:15 PM ET • 8:15 PM CET

Latvia vs Switzerland

Latvia
Confirmed lineup

Goaltenders:
30 Elvis Merzļikins
50 Kristers Gudļevskis

Defensemen:
58 Guntis Galviņš - 27 Oskar Cibuļskis
29 Ralfs Freibergs - 11 Kristaps Sotnieks
32 Artūrs Kulda - 26 Uvis Balinskis
77 Kristaps Zīle

Forwards:
10 Lauris Dārziņš - 23 Theodor Blueger - 70 Miks Indrašis
91 Ronalds Ķēniņš - 18 Rodrigo Ābols - 21 Rūdolfs Balcers
71 Roberts Bukarts - 87 Gints Meija - 14 Rihards Bukarts
49 Emīls Ģēģeris - 95 Oskars Batņa - 17 Mārtiņš Dzierkals
12 Rihards Marenis

Scratched:
G 31 Gustavs Grigals


Switzerland
Confirmed lineup

Goaltenders:
63 Leonardo Genoni
20 Reto Berra

Defensemen:
90 Roman Josi - 6 Yannick Weber
16 Raphael Diaz - 86 Janis Moser
55 Romain Loeffel - 76 Joël Genazzi
45 Michael Fora - 38 Lukas Frick

Forwards:
21 Kevin Fiala - 13 Nico Hischier - 8 Vincent Praplan
82 Simon Moser - 92 Gaëtan Haas - 10 Andres Ambühl
15 Grégory Hofmann - 23 Philipp Kurashev - 93 Lino Martschini
60 Tristan Scherwey - 64 Christoph Bertschy - 46 Noah Rod

​

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[Retroglyphs]

This will be very very interesting to watch, and could go either way.

Team Latvia 3 - Team Switzerland 2, after PS

 

[Marky1999]

Latvia 2-1 in OT

 

[EK47]

Both teams look great so far, well coached hard to play against and Switzerland has some respectable edge. Whoever looses this game could still make a poorly coached team Sweden miss a quarterfinal for the first time in like... Ever?

60/40 edge Switzerland.

 

[swisdan]

Switzerland is the favorite. No doubt. Very important game for the quarter final. But should be a closed game.

 

[MapleAce]

Any info about Switzerland goalie today?

Team Switzerland looks just simply great and will be tough nut to crack in the playoffs. Again...

 

[Namejs]

Switzerland is the favorite. No doubt. Very important game for the quarter final. But should be a closed game.

In terms of forward corps, we're actually surprisingly close. The only difference in terms of NHLe is due to how bad our 4th line is due to injuries, but they have a 100% shutdown/energy role anyway.

1st line SUI 0.47 vs 0.45 1st line LAT
2nd line 0.28 vs 0.35
3rd line 0.38 vs 0.32
4th line 0,22 vs 0.13

Your defence has a bunch of excellent two-way defencemen. That top pairing is just 2 tiers above anything we can offer. It's going to be a pain in the ass to be on the PK against them.

In terms of goaltending, we're pretty even by my book. Merzlikins and Genoni are both real good top tier European goalies.

So it's something like
F 7.5/10 vs 7/10
D 7.5/10 vs 6/10
G 8/10 vs 8/10

 

[jonas2244]

Genoni in goal I guess. Andrighetto arrived in Bratislava but won't play tonight.

 

[Speyer]

NHLe is a complete joke. The whole system is fundamentally flawed. It uses only statistics (who are often outdated) and not experts opionions for their translation numbers. According to this system the NCAA is a better league than the NLA wich is ridiculous. Especially for Leagues with not many players going tho the NHL (like the NLA) this stat is basically worthless.

The game against Latvia will still be very close. I see us as slim favourites with a slight edge on both top level talent and depth. In goal Genoni and Merzlikins are about even like it was said before. Getting an early goal will be the key to victory. If we can't manage to score early, it could become a nailbiter and even go to overtime. We need to be careful not to loose our head in the offensive zone. I rember some turnovers from guys like Josi and Hischier yesterday that would be costly against a team like Latvia.

 

[filip85]

SO leaders for Swiss at WC's since 1998.

Gerber - 5
Berra - 3
Genoni - 3
Stephan - 1
Aebischer - 1

 

[king89]

Gerber was amazing in 2013 WC.

 

[mosare]

as the swiss roster is soo much better than the latvia roster it should be a WIN for the swiss with 2-3 goals difference. But u never know, the latvia are never easy to play.

 

[mosare]

In terms of forward corps, we're actually surprisingly close. The only difference in terms of NHLe is due to how bad our 4th line is due to injuries, but they have a 100% shutdown/energy role anyway.

Hischier; Fiala and Josi are much better than any other latvia players. But still, i also think it would be a close game

 

[BruinLVGA]

Switzerland ought to be the favorite by a bit, but Latvia is not a team to underestimate. They could beat us and I wouldn't be surprised. Shame I won't be able to watch it all, as the Bruins are on more or less at the same time.

 

[Namejs]

NHLe is a complete joke. The whole system is fundamentally flawed. It uses only statistics (who are often outdated) and not experts opionions for their translation numbers. According to this system the NCAA is a better league than the NLA wich is ridiculous. Especially for Leagues with not many players going tho the NHL (like the NLA) this stat is basically worthless.

The game against Latvia will still be very close. I see us as slim favourites with a slight edge on both top level talent and depth. In goal Genoni and Merzlikins are about even like it was said before. Getting an early goal will be the key to victory. If we can't manage to score early, it could become a nailbiter and even go to overtime. We need to be careful not to loose our head in the offensive zone. I rember some turnovers from guys like Josi and Hischier yesterday that would be costly against a team like Latvia.

NHLe is not fundamentally flawed at all. It makes perfect sense, the method works and it is the best possible tool in player comparison. It does have a small sample size with NLA, which leads to a high margin of error.

Of course it doesn't capture reality perfectly. But it does give you an insight and a general idea. Nothing more.

Oh, and NLA NHLe is significantly higher than most NCAA D1 conferences. It's at the level of Liiga and Czech Extraliga.

 

[Namejs]

Hischier; Fiala and Josi are much better than any other latvia players. But still, i also think it would be a close game

True for Hischier and Josi. The only problem with that is that there are 20 other Swiss players.

 

[Speyer]

NHLe is not fundamentally flawed at all. It makes perfect sense, the method works and it is the best possible tool in player comparison. It does have a small sample size with NLA, which leads to a high margin of error.

Of course it doesn't capture reality perfectly. But it does give you an insight and a general idea. Nothing more.

Oh, and NLA NHLe is significantly higher than most NCAA D1 conferences. It's at the level of Liiga and Czech Extraliga.

I guess we just have to agree to disagree on that topic. I already had this disussion with other members of this board and I am just fundamentally against evaluating players on advanced stats alone. Yes you were right on the bolded part I had some old numbers in mind but the NCAA is still ranked to high in my opinion, as is the KHL for that mather.

 

[BruinLVGA]

True for Hischier and Josi. The only problem with that is that there are 20 other Swiss players.

And what "problem" would that be?

 

[Namejs]

I guess we just have to agree to disagree on that topic. I already had this disussion with other members of this board and I am just fundamentally against evaluating players on advanced stats alone. Yes you were right on the bolded part I had some old numbers in mind but the NCAA is still ranked to high in my opinion, as is the KHL for that mather.

If I had more free time, I'd love to update the whole thing and cross-reference NHL along with SHL and KHL, which would give a lot more complete picture.

NCAA is quite a weird case due to player usage. As for KHL, I partially agree. You'd have to eliminate some top end cases from the sample to get a better picture there.

But you obviously have to account for all sorts of things when comparing rosters.

 

[Namejs]

And what "problem" would that be?

You don't have 12 Hischiers or 6 Josis. The rest of the team is at the level of Latvian players. And they're the ones who are going to be on the ice for most of the game.

 

[jonas2244]

But you obviously have to account for all sorts of things when comparing rosters.

And in the end hockey is played on the ice and it doesn't matter if someone has the better roster or not if you win or if you loose.

 

[Namejs]

And in the end hockey is played on the ice and it doesn't matter if someone has the better roster or not if you win or if you loose.

Right, the Swiss might have Josi, but we have our Baltic Sisu and there's nothing to match that.

 

[BruinLVGA]

You don't have 12 Hischiers or 6 Josis. The rest of the team is at the level of Latvian players. And they're the ones who are going to be on the ice for most of the game.

It must've been all luck then, that we got a silver last year and two of them in the past five years, while you guys have reached the quarter finals last year, after missing it for 7-8 straight World Championships?

 

[duga]

Right, the Swiss might have Josi, but we have our Baltic Sisu and there's nothing to match that.

Is it any different from the Finn Sisu?​

 

[The Worst One]

In terms of forward corps, we're actually surprisingly close. The only difference in terms of NHLe is due to how bad our 4th line is due to injuries, but they have a 100% shutdown/energy role anyway.

1st line SUI 0.47 vs 0.45 1st line LAT
2nd line 0.28 vs 0.35
3rd line 0.38 vs 0.32
4th line 0,22 vs 0.13

Your defence has a bunch of excellent two-way defencemen. That top pairing is just 2 tiers above anything we can offer. It's going to be a pain in the ass to be on the PK against them.

In terms of goaltending, we're pretty even by my book. Merzlikins and Genoni are both real good top tier European goalies.

So it's something like
F 7.5/10 vs 7/10
D 7.5/10 vs 6/10
G 8/10 vs 8/10

Yannick Weber is trash.