STOCKHOLM – In Norway’s rout of Germany, Patrick Thoresen enjoyed a career game. With three goals and six points, his was one of the most impressive individual performances of the tournament alongside Yevgeni Malkin’s five-point effort against Sweden. No one, and certainly not Norway's players, could have foreseen such a dominant performance by a team and a player. So complete was Norway’s win that even Thoresen was somewhat surprised at the 12-4 result. “I think we were as shocked as a lot of other people,” he said. “We didn’t expect to [win] as easily as we did. Their goalies had a rough day on the job.” Norway scored 12 goals on 32 shots, scoring on 38% of their shots taken. “They let in about one out of every three shots,” said Thoresen. “We were just sitting on the bench, looking at each other, saying: ‘What’s going on here? Is this for real, or is this a dream?’ We were up 9-1 after [two periods].” Individually, Thoresen enjoyed the most complete performance in World Championship competition. He’s been an example of on ice leadership, staying positive, focused and engaged on the task at hand. Coming into the game Norway was one point ahead of Germany and Latvia for the fourth and final quarter-final spot in the Stockholm Group. Having just beaten Latvia 3-0, a win against Germany would further solidify their playoff chances. After Latvia's loss to Denmark, the Norwegians have their quarter-final spot ensured. During the hockey season, Thoresen plies his trade in the Kontinental Hockey League since 2009, starting with Salavat Yulayev Ufa and then moving to SKA St. Petersburg this past season. “It’s great hockey and I’m having a really good time in Russia,” he said of his KHL experience. Thoresen has been extremely productive KHL performer with 135 points in three seasons. In 2010-11, Salavat won the KHL Gagarin Cup with Thoresen and Alexander Radulov leading the way. Radulov led the league in scoring and Thoresen with 65 points was second. In the playoffs, Radulov and Thoresen tied for their team lead in scoring with 18 points. With his twelve points so far, Thoresen has doubled his previous best in tournament scoring output. With one last game to go in the Preliminary Round, the Norwegians are certainly looking forward to a strong finish and then focus on what they hope will be medal competing World Championship hockey. JOHN SANFUL