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Canada rallies from three-goal deficit to down Sweden at worlds

Tyler Ennis and his Canadian teammates have time to savour their comeback victory over Sweden at the world hockey championship.Ennis’s power-play goal at 13:31 of the third period proved to be the winner as Canada defeated Sweden 6-4 on Wednesday, rallying from a 3-0 first-period deficit. The Canadians don’t play again until Saturday when they face off against France.

PRAGUE, Czech Republic — Tyler Ennis and his Canadian teammates have time to savour their comeback victory over Sweden at the world hockey championship.

Ennis’s power-play goal at 13:31 of the third period proved to be the winner as Canada defeated Sweden 6-4 on Wednesday, rallying from a 3-0 first-period deficit. The Canadians don’t play again until Saturday when they face off against France.

“We talked in between periods and knew we could do a lot better,” the Buffalo Sabres forward. “It wasn’t the start we were looking for.

“They took it to us but in the second we started playing the body a lot more.”

Ennis said the two-day break is a welcome one.

“Yeah, it comes at a good time,” Ennis said. “It gives us time to clean up a few things.”

Patrick Wiercioch and Tyler Seguin also had third-period goals for Canada (4-0-0), which remains atop the Group A standings four points ahead of Sweden (2-1-1) and Switzerland (2-0-2). The Swiss dropped a 2-1 overtime decision to Latvia on Wednesday.

Seguin had the insurance marker at 18:10 after Wiercioch made it 4-4 at 10:24 as Canada outshot Sweden 39-32.

“We had a pretty much big wakeup call in the first,” Seguin said. “A lot of guys were talking . . . and we put it all together and came away with three points.”

Swedish forward Filip Forsberg said the Canadians outplayed his team after the first.

“Obviously our first period was really good, but after that, Canada turned it up and we sat back a little too much and let them come attack us,” said Forsberg. “That’s not going to cut it against this good of a team.

“That was the biggest thing. They’re a good team, but so are we. It was a good game.”

Sean Courturier, Tyler Hall and Aaron Ekblad also scored for Canada, which had 11 players register points in the game. Hall is tied with Forsberg for the tournament lead in goals (five) and Russian Yevgeni Dadnov for the overall scoring lead (eight points).

Canadian team captain Sidney Crosby (four goals, three assists) is just one point behind Hall and Dadnov.

Forsberg, Victor Rask, Anton Lander and Oscar Moller scored for Sweden, which faces Germany on Thursday.

Lander opened the scoring at 5:06 of the first before Rask made it 2-0 at 17:21. Forsberg then scored just 28 seconds later as Sweden outshot Canada 14-5 in the period.

Ekblad scored Canada’s first goal of the game at 6:43 of the second. Hall made it a one-goal contest at 11:27 before Courturier tied it at 14:23.

Moller put Sweden back ahead 4-3 at 15:19.