NARVA, Estonia – Estonia will be back in the World Championship Division I in 2011 after two years. The Estonians won the Division II Group B in Narva.

The Estonians wre among the top Division I teams for many years until geting relegated in 2008.

Last year in Novi Sad, the Estonians won five of six Division II games with double digits, but a surprising 5-4 loss in a shootout against host nation Serbia kept “Eesti” from the gold.

This year when Estonia hosted the tournament in Narva, the scores were lopsided again, but this time they didn’t allow a surprise.

Estonia steamrolled through the tournament against Israel (17-3), China (15-0), New Zealand (17-0) and Iceland (6-1) before meeting the other undefeated team Romania in the last game. But the Romanians were no challenge for Estonia as the game ended with a 7-1 victory.

There were two visible changes on the national team from last year. Last summer, the Estonians hired a new Finnish coaching tandem with Ismo Lehkonen and Jukka Ropponen.

“What can be better than playing for the championship in front of the home crowd and live on TV? If this does not fire up us as a team, then nothing does”, Ropponen said.

Second, the veteran starting goalkeeper Villem-Henrik Koitmaa was replaced by Mark Rajevski, who turned 20 two weeks ago. Rajevski played on the men’s, U20 and U18 national teams in the same year in 2007-2008. After that, he left to play Canadian junior hockey for the Brock Bucks. He returned for the tournament and took over the number-one position on the second game day.

Rajevski impressed with a 97.75 save percentage and 87 saves with only two goals allowed in four games.

Rajevski was named the directorate for the Best Goalkeeper. Teammates Andrei Markov, the tournament’s scoring leader with 14 goals and as many assists in five games, was the MVP and Best Forward while Dmitri Suuri was named the Best Defenceman.

Romania took silver and Iceland won the bronze - the first medal for the country at that level.

Israel, which had a one-year stint in Division I a couple of years ago, lost all games and was relegated to Division III next year.

More information: Scores & Stats, Photo Gallery