USA went on to play Slovakia on Monday. USA crushed them in a 9-3 victory which gives them the opportunity to play in the quarter finals starting on Wednesday. Slovakia had some poor goal tending which the Americans took advantage of.

While USA is happy to not have to go to the regulation round they may run into trouble when playing Czech Republic on Wednesday. Flyers prospect Shayne Gostisbehere was given a slashing penalty and a game misconduct for slashing at a Slovakia player in the groin area. He has since been suspended for one game and will not play in Wednesday’s game.

If Team USA advances, they will play a rematch against Team Canada.

Courtesy of sportslogos.net

Preliminary rounds for the IIHF under 20 world juniors began and Team USA has already dropped to the third spot in the Group B rankings.  They are 2-1-0 with 3 points.

On Thursday Team USA annihilated Team Germany in an 8-0 shutout loss and then went on to play team Russia on Friday morning.

Team Russia beat the Americans 2-1. Russia is the top seed for Group B 3-2-1 with 18 points.

Despite the loss, Flyers 3rd round draft pick Shayne Gostisbehere is making waves and impressing the Flyers organization. Gostisbehere scored a power play goal in the game against germany and was active with the puck in Friday’s game.  He is definitely a guy to be looking at for a future.

Gostisbehere currently attends Union College in Schenectady, NY. He has plans to continue with his education and graduate before making his NHL debut.

Team USA will take on Team Canada early Sunday morning at 4:30 a.m. Canada is second in Group B just below Russia, with 2-2-0 and 6 points. Since hockey is “Canada’s game” the game against them will be just as tough if not tougher than the game against the Russians.

Mandatory Credit: Jake Roth-USA TODAY Sports

Flyers’ prospect Shayne Gostisbehere is still on the roster for Team USA’s world junior championship. Exhibition games began this weekend and Team USA’s first game of the competition will be this Thursday at 9 am EST on the NHL Network. They will play Germany.

In the first exhibition game against Sweden, Team USA defeated the Swedes 4-3 in a shootout in overtime, so things were looking good for the young kids, but then they played Team Finland. The Finns destroyed Team USA 5-1 which led USA Hockey to hold off from announcing the three players that were going to get cut from the team.

Since then, the team has announced that they were cutting defenseman Brady Skjei and forward Stefan Matteau. They boarded the plane to Ufa, Russia with a 24 man roster when they are only allowed 23 for the competition. They are expected to release defensemen Connor Murphy as he is currently has a upper body injury.

It hasn’t been officially announced but it’s safe to say that Gostisbehere will be the Flyers ambassador for world juniors this year for Team USA. Is anyone else chanting USA! USA! USA?