NEWSLETTER
The Blackhawks have four players playing in the IIHF Worlds that kicked off this morning and are set to run through May 29. I say four because as Tab wrote earlier, Caleb Jones was sent home because of an undisclosed injury.
Blackhawks World Championship Update: Caleb Jones Leaves Injured, Sam Lafferty and Seth Jones Scorehttps://t.co/dDr6WZK1FP pic.twitter.com/unImKyIWR8
— Bleacher Nation Blackhawks (@BN_Blackhawks) May 13, 2022
However, Caleb’s older brother Seth Jones and fellow Blackhawks teammate Sam Lafferty are still participating and both delivered for Team USA in their 4-1 victory over Latvia in the opening game of Group B at the 2022 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship.
Seth Jones – who was named the captain of the USA roster – recorded a power-play goal and a shorthanded assist just 1:18 apart in the first period to get the Americans going early against Latvia. Sam Lafferty made it 4-0 USA later in the game. Seth Jones said that the Americans played well in their first game despite some sloppy moments in the middle of the game.
“I thought we played well; we got off to a decent start,” said Jones, who is playing in his third World Championship. “I thought Strauss made some big saves early to keep us 0-0 and then special teams is good for us. We got a power-play goal and a penalty-kill goal as well. Then we got a little sloppy in the third but we finished it off pretty well.”
“We had a great power-play movement, we got a lot of push to the net, tried to get a little crush on them,” said Jones. “They got tired and we wanted to keep shooting the puck. We had some action around the net and luckily one squeaked through.”
It was nice to see Seth Jones shooting and scoring on the power play for Team USA today. Kyle Davidson said last week that Jones was going to continue to be on the Blackhawks’ top power-play line but noted that he wanted to see him shoot more than he did this season when Chicago finished with zero power-play goals from their defenseman. Team USA gets a day off before they take on Austria on Sunday.
Philipp Kurashev is playing for Switzerland and Blackhawks UFA Erik Gustafsson is playing for Sweeden. Both are off today and will play their first game tomorrow.
