Czech hockey players have never made it to the semifinals of the World Championship. Three times they ended up on hockey sticks of the Suomi selection. They finally managed to break this opponent. “I’m excited about the girls. I am lucky to be able to help them see their potential. I’m watching this success from the front row and I couldn’t be more proud of the players,” MacLeod said in an interview for the championship website.
“Some players have been here for ten, fifteen years. And he tries to take that one step among the elite. Qualifying for the Winter Olympics was already a huge success, but the girls wanted even higher,” continued the coach.
The key to the quarter-final success was the team performance, from which three key women took off. Goalkeeper Klára Peslarová is the best goalkeeper in the championship with a save success rate of 96.59%, and she made 36 saves against Finland. “It was a difficult match for me. The opponents pushed very well in the goal, so it was difficult for me to follow the puck,” explained Peslarová. “But the defense blocked well and the girls shouted at me where the puck was bouncing. Communication was key.”
The second heroine was Daniela Pejšová, the most productive defender of the tournament scored the fourth goal in the second period and the eighth point overall. “We didn’t get the signal after the throw-in, but she stayed on the right circle and the puck came to me. So I just turned around and fired, as the coaches advise us,” smiled Pejšová, who spent over 27 minutes on the ice and took care of the leading goal.
Aneta Tejralová scored the decisive goal in overtime. The Czech defender saved her first goal for the best possible opportunity when, after 41 seconds of extra time, she read the game brilliantly. “I attacked their captain. I heard the coach’s instruction to throw the puck away, so I automatically went to the goalpost,” described the author of the winning goal for hokey.cz.
However, she originally did not want to finish. “I planned to record in the second wave. I don’t know what happened… God helped me with the fact that I shot,” she struggled to find the words. But to everyone’s surprise, the shot at the near post went into the net. “The euphoria is indescribable. I told the girls to pinch me if is it at all real,” Tejralová added with a smile.
