Red Wings In Russia: Detroit Well Represented at Worlds

After a disappointing first round exit for the Detroit Red Wings many of their players were able to assess the damage done to their bodies and decide if they wanted to compete for their country at the world championships in Moscow this month.

Six players have taken on that challenge.

The hosts, Russia, boast the most Red Wings on their roster (2), including Pavel Datsyuk who was named captain of the squad, and defenseman Alexey Marchenko.

Finland (Teemu Pulkkinen), Sweden (Gustav Nyquist), Slovakia (Tomas Jurco), and the United States (Dylan Larkin), are the other Red Wings representing their country in Moscow.

Nyquist has made the biggest impact in the tournament's first couple of days. He scored the overtime game winner in Sweden's opener against Latvia for a 2-1 win.

Team Russia fizzled in their first game, a 3-0 loss to the Czech Republlic did not have the fans in a good mood, but there are still six games left in pool play for the Russians.

Pulkkinen picked up an assist in a big 6-2 win over Belarus as the Finns got their tournament started right.

The Americans were feeling the opposite way, suffering a bad 5-1 loss to Team Canada in their opening game.

All those games took place on Friday.

On Saturday, Tomas Jurco was the star of the show for Slovakia. He had a multi point game including the game winning goal in a 4-1 win over Hungary.

Pool play goes until May 17 when the two pools of eight are whittled down into a final 8-team knockout tournament to decide the IIHF World Champions for 2016.