Hungary will face host team Norway tonight at 19:00 in their opening game at the EIHC 4 Nations Tournament.
In the past decade Norway has become a staple of the A-Pool, at this past world championships they finished sixth in their group and three points above the relegation position. They will have just about everyone available from their World Championship roster when they face Hungary. The roster is filled with players playing in top European leagues and former NHL draft picks.
Norway is very strong in net as all three goalies were on the World championship roster with two of them being NHL draft picks, Steffen Soberg by the Capitals and lars Volden by the Bruins, both in 2011. All three goalies have multiple World Championships under their belt.
On defense they look pretty strong as well, the most accomplished player is Ole-Kristian Tollefsen who played 163 NHL games for the Blue Jackets and the Flyers, Stefan Espeland and Nicolai Bryhnisveen can help with the scoring if needed.
The forwards have a number of world championship games on their resume two veterans who could step up to be counted on are Morten Ask and Anders Bastiansen, Mathis Olimb was the leading scorer with 8 points in 7 seven games. One player that could be familiar to people is Kristian Forsberg who was teammates with János Hári in MODO.
“The more talented Norwegians usually play in Sweden and they are able to pick this Swedish style up pretty easily, which can easily be seen in the Norwegian style, unlike their Scandinavian counterparts they are mentally a lot more easy going on the ice.” said injured forward István Bartalis.