Canada has earned their way to Tuesday’s gold medal game against the United States, and they’ve done so in dominant fashion with a shutout win against Russia in the semi-final round.
Goaltender Devon Levi has absolutely stood on top of his head so far in the World Juniors, boasting an absurd .975 save percentage with 116 saves on 119 shots. The shutout against Russia was his third of the tournament, which is good to tie the World Juniors shutout record set by Canadian goaltender Justin Pogge in 2006.
You know what that means? If Levi can come through with one more shutout in the gold medal game, he’ll have the record outright.
There are so many ways you could look at Levi’s statistics, such as the fact that he has many shutouts as goals allowed in the tournament so far. The only goalie with a higher save percentage than Levi is U.S. backup Dustin Wolf, who remains perfect but has faced just 21 shots so far. Levi’s save percentage currently tops Pogge’s from 2006 (.952), although we’ll still shout out Pogge for his shutout in the gold medal game against Russia.
Of course, in a situation like this, there’s plenty of credit to go around, and the defensive support is obviously a big factor for Levi’s play. The United States have been second only to Canada in terms of goal-scoring so far, so they’ll present a pretty significant challenge to Levi and the Canadians in the gold medal game.
Something to watch? Of the four goals that Canada has allowed as a team so far, not a single one of them has come during even-strength play. The Canadians have looked absolutely dominant so far.
