ERZURUM, Turkey – The Russian U17 national team beat Belarus in the final to win gold at the ice hockey tournament of the European Youth Olympic Festival that was held in Erzurum in eastern Turkey.

“I'm really happy about the gold medal, because this is a big tournament. I believe that we will do even bigger things in the future,” said Russian captain Artemi Knyazev, who plays for the Ak Bars Kazan youth teams.

After beating Slovakia 4-2 in the semi-final, the gold medal game in front of 1,400 fans was a clear affair. Ilya Safonov opened the scoring already after less than two minutes of play and Matvei Guskov’s power-play marker a few minutes later was already the game-winning goal even if Belarus replied with a power-play goal to cut the deficit before the first intermission. An early second-period goal and four unanswered markers in the third period sealed the win for Russia, 7-1.

The goals in the game came from eight different players. Vasili Podkolzin had most points with one goal and two assists.

“We came to Erzurum for the first time. We had a new team and our plan was to play a team game. We did it very well and we are champion now. I’m happy,” head coach Vladimir Flatov said.

After several National Olympic Committees withdrew their delegations due to fear because Erzurum is about 300 kilometres away from troubled areas of Iraq and Syria, including the Latvian and Swiss ice hockey teams, the organizers had to be flexible. In ice hockey that meant five instead of six teams and host Turkey getting a unique chance to have its juniors play against some of the very top players of this age category. Despite recent progress in youth hockey, which was visible in the U18 and U20 team moving up several spots in the recent IIHF tournaments, the gap was still big and Turkey left the tournament winless after defeats to Russia and France.

“I hear that the Turkish team is very new. My opinion is that in the future they will be better. But they need to do hard work,” Russian head coach Flatov said.

Also Knyazev has praise for the host country: “Erzurum and the venues were great. I’m glad to be here. Turkish hockey will be nice in 10 years. They need time and good work.”

Behind the finalists and before Turkey, Slovakia and France were battling for the bronze medals. The Slovak team had the better start with two unanswered goals from Sebastian Hudec and Adam Pauliny in the first and second period respectively.

France came back as the teams exchanged goals in the last few minutes of the game but Pauliny’s second goal stayed as the game-winner in Slovakia’s 3-2 victory.

MARTIN MERK

Irfan Kurudirek of the European Youth Olympic Festival organizing committee contributed to this story.