TORONTO, 7 September 2004 — Alexei Kovalev scored the go-ahead goal midway through the second period to give Russia a 5-2 win over Slovakia in the final round-robin game of the North American Pool at the World Cup of Hockey on Sunday.

Kovalev picked up an errant pass at the Slovakia blueline and fired a wrist shot past goalie Jan Lasak at 12:01 of the second period to put Russia (2-1) ahead to stay.

The win gives Russia second spot in the four-team North American pool standings behind unbeaten Canada (3-0). Russia will travel to St Paul, Minnesota for its quarterfinal against the United States (1-2) today.

“It doesn’t matter who you play, it’s going to be a tough game no matter what,” Russian forward Alexei Yashin said of the match-up with the Americans, who the Russians beat 3-1 in the round-robin. Slovakia (0-3) now faces the daunting task of trying to beat Canada at the Air Canada Centre in its quarterfinal game tomorrow.

The Russians finally got some production from some of their stars against the Slovaks after struggling offensively one night earlier in a 3-1 loss to Canada. Pavel Datsyuk opened the scoring for Russia at 8:10 of the opening period, taking passes from Andrei Markov and Alexander Frolov for his first goal of the tournament.

Slovakia tied the game on a goal by Marian Hossa two minutes later, but the Russians took control with a pair of second period goals. Kovalev’s second goal of the tournament put Russia back in front and less than four minutes later, Sergei Samsonov gave the Russians a 3-1 lead with his first goal of the tournament.

Russia added an insurance goal just 59 seconds into the third period, with Alexei Yashin taking a pass from Frolov and drilling a shot past Lasak for a shorthanded marker. Slovakia’s Marian Gaborik got one goal back with his goal at 5:47 off a Russian giveaway, beating Ilya Bryzgalov cleanly on a breakaway, but highly touted youngster Alexander Ovechkin restored Russia’s three-goal lead at 7:21.

“We can’t let players like the Russians get two-on-ones and the three-on-twos,” Gaborik said. “They are going to beat you when that happens.”

In the European Pool quarterfinals, Finland (2-0-1) faces Germany (0-3) on Monday and Sweden (2-0-1) battles the Czech Republic (1-2) today. The two teams to emerge from those games will head across the Atlantic to take on the winning sides from the North American Pool quarter-finals. The final is in Toronto on Sept. 14.

Meanwhile, New York Islanders defenseman Janne Niinimaa has walked out on Finland ahead of their quarter-final against Germany due to a personality clash with coach Raimo Summanen. Finnish newspapers were in a frenzy yesterday after Niinimaa’s move, which was announced by the team late on Sunday.

The team cited “chemistry problems with head coach Raimo Summanen” for Niinimaa’s departure. “The team finds Niinimaa’s decision regrettable, but will try to focus on upcoming games as well as possible,” it added.

“Crisis!” tabloid Iltalehti wrote across its front page, while Ilta-Sanomat devoted five pages to the story, including a three-day summary on how events came to a head. Iltalehti also questioned how long Summanen, known for taking a more confrontational line with his players than predecessor Hannu Aravirta, could stay in the job. Summanen said after Saturday’s match that he had to “be rough on some of the players and really wake them up”.

The World Cup, tainted by a looming NHL labor war and tinged by tragedy, enters what Canada coach Pat Quinn dubbed the “scary” stage, with sudden death elimination games.

“The first three games don’t matter. Elimination games are scary because you can do everything you planned on doing and not get the result you like — that is the fear of it,” Quinn said.

Canada, which scorched through the preliminary stage with the only 100 percent record, is the hot favorite to add the World Cup to a trophy cabinet stuffed with the Olympic title and the World Championship.

Quinn will ice the NHL’s top netminder Martin Brodeur, and forwards including “the Magnificent One” Mario Lemieux, still spellbinding at 38, for tomorrow’s quarterfinal with whipping boys Slovakia.

But Canada is down to only six healthy defensemen after losing two to injury during the tournament and blue-line studs Chris Pronger and Rob Blake before it started.

Fancied Sweden, hoping shaky goaltending doesn’t doom another championship run by the likes of NHL All Stars Peter Forsberg and Mats Sundin, today hosts Jaromir Jagr’s Czech Republic.