Davos win Spengler Cup

Team Canada's goalkeeper Patrick Desrochers saves from Davos's Patrick Fischer Keystone

Davos have won the Spengler Cup for the second year in succession after snatching a dramatic 4-3 victory over Team Canada.

Lonny Bohonos scored the deciding goal two minutes into overtime with a brilliant solo effort. Picking up the puck from behind his own net, Bohonos skated the length of the ice, beating two Team Canada players before slotting past the ‘keeper.

It was sweet revenge for the home side who only 24 hours earlier thought their dreams of winning a second successive Spengler Cup were in ruins after they lost 5-6 to Team Canada in their final group match.

Davos only scraped into the final by virtue of Sparta Prague’s victory over the Finnish team, Turku.

The final began sluggishly with both teams clearly suffering from the effects of having to play five games in six days, but the fuse was lit for a second epic match between the two sides early in the second period.

Team Canada’s Reggie Savage opened the scoring in the 25th minute with a close-range strike. But the lead was short-lived as the home side hit back with two goals in the 28th minute from Björn Christen and the Swede Morgan Samuelsson.

The capacity 7,680 crowd was then sent into raptures four minutes later when Fredrik Nilsson put Davos 3-1 up. But, as with Saturday’s ding-dong affair, neither side could stop to draw breath, and within 28 seconds Team Canada had pulled the score back to 3-2, with Jamie Wright capitalising on an error by Davos ‘keeper Lars Weibel.

Then in the 47th minute the stadium went silent as Team Canada’s Jan Alston side-footed the puck in to make it 3-3. But then along came Bohonos to ensure that New Year’s Eve in Davos started with a bang.

swissinfo