Today's the day, the Playoff Round/Quarterfinals begin ... the 'Big Six' (Finland, Sweden, Russia, Canada, Czech Republic & the United States) & the 'little Two' (Norway & Slovakia) ... it's 'win-or-go-home' time from here on out and we get down to the nitty-gritty ... games on tap for today are:

#57) CAN vs SVK (tied 3-3 in the third period, as I post)
#58) RUS vs NOR
#59) USA vs FIN (51% of IIHF.com visitors pick USA over Finland in poll) 12:00pm EST
#60) SWE vs CZE

... it's 'March Madness', IIHF style, , woohoo! Come on, USA! Yeah, we beat 'em in the prelims, but the Fins are the defending champs and they're playing in front of the home crowd ... gonna' be a good one.

http://stats.iihf.com/Hydra/272/IHM2729900_76_2_0.pdf

Did I ever tell you about what happened last year in Ferris' home exhibition game against Toronto? (Only game against a foreign opponent of the year)

USA has got this...Jimmy Howard

Slovaks win!
hopefully US game is televised

Slovakia has some stars- and a lot of experience (in other words, ex-NHLers who have gotten old Handzus, Stumpel, Zednik, Demitra). Not as big an upset as it seems.

Oh man, they upset Canada ... my boys over in Windsor, ONT are gonna' be crying, , they're already sore over not being able to retain the Stanley Cup north of the border ... I may not be able to cross the border until things cool down, ... couldn't get the USA/FIN game to save my life, not on TV, can't stream it & the YouTube link wasn't working ... doesn't matter, just saw on the IIHF site that Finland won 3-2 ... dammit! ... from the summary, it looks like Finland was able to stay out of the penalty box & capitalize when we were in the box, then fought back after we took a one goal lead ... this has been one nasty hockey season for any team I rooted for ... I hope at least to be able to see some highlights somewhere, aaaggghhh!

I believe it was with EIGHT seconds left in regulation

Dammit Jimmy! Oh well

Finland dumps the USA, Slovokia eliminates Canada ... what a sad state of affairs for North American Hockey ... could this be yet another step in the European's gradual domination of the sport?

No...Europe will bow...if not next year, in the Olympics where more people will care

or perhaps dominance will come from elsewhere:

The International Ice Hockey Federation has added Qatar and Jamaica as its 71st and 72nd member nations.