Favourites dominate the group stage – quarter-finals all set

The group stage of the IIHF eWorld Championship 2023 held no big surprises, with all favourites advancing  to the quarter-finals and setting up an exciting first knock-out stage.

Will the favourites struggle or even fail to advance to the quarter-finals? The simple answer to the omnipresent question leading up to the group stage of the IIHF eWorld Championship 2023: no. Starting on Saturday with group C the big ice hockey nations lived up to the expectations on the virtual rink of NHL™ 23.

Czechia secured first place in group C two points ahead of Germany. Slovakia was close, but came in third thanks to the matchup against Germany. Dennis „Maverick_28V“ Mjartan lost 0-1 to Luca „Cpt_DirtyDangler“ Knoll and Sandra „LadyBrunette“ Demitrova fell against Kevin „Kevinator-373“ Würterle in overtime (3-4).

Finland plays the perfect group stage

Czechia will face Latvia in the quarter-finals and Germany must try to upset the defending champion Finland. Erik „EkiOriginal“ Tammenpää and Jesse „JesseL2002“ Linden. The dynamic Finnish duo didn’t lose a single point in group A landing them in first place with a goal difference of 48-8. Latvia had to fight until the end to pull ahead of Denmark, and two wins against Italy (5-0 and 5-3) was just enough.

Group D was dominated by Sweden, Henrik „eken45jr“ Eklund took the only defeat of the group stage in his last game against the Swiss Mirco „Tron1x90“ Salvi (3-4). „Tron1x90“ and his teammate Niklas „HOEFI_24“ Hofmann had reason to celebrate as well: Switzerland advanced to the quarter-finals thanks to their second-place finish ahead of Norway and France.

Close battles between North American giants

While the Swiss will challenge Canada this upcoming weekend, Sweden has to compete against the United States. The US team lost the battle for first place in group B against their North American neighbour coming in two points short. The tightness of the duel was shown through the direct games: Canadian PlayStation player Samuel „CadCooks“ Landry bet Dylan „Dods“ Dodson with 7-6, US Xbox player Matthew „TSCCookie“ Gutkoski defeated Justin „Regs84“ Reguly in overtime (3-2).

The quarter-finals will be played on Saturday and Sunday with two games each on PlayStation and Xbox – the results get aggregated for a decision. All quarter-finals overview will be live-streamed on the Twitch channel of the IIHF, separate streams are available in Finnish and German.

Saturday:

Main stream (16.45 UTC): https://www.twitch.tv/iihfhockey

Sunday:

Main stream (16.45 UTC): https://www.twitch.tv/iihfhockey

German stream (16.45 UTC): https://www.twitch.tv/bl00dylp

Finnish stream (19.15 UTC): https://www.twitch.tv/sportsgamergg