The event took place over the final weekend of August, much earlier than usual due to the Olympic Winter Games in February, and it was the Finns who seemed to be in best shape for the final international tournament to be held before the season kick-off in European league play.

The Finns beat host Czech Republic 3-1 on the opening day thanks to a pair of goals from Jori Lehterä and a strong performance of Atte Engren, who had 40 saves. In their second game the Finns blanked Russia 2-0 with goals from Sakari Salminen and Pekka Jormakka while Mikko Koskinen had a shutout with 17 saves.

Another strong performance on Sunday led the Lions to a 5-0 blanking of archrival Sweden. Engren also got his shutout with 26 saves. Oskar Osala scored two goals and Leo Komarov one while Salminen and Jormakka levelled their goal stats as well.

Jormakka became the goal scoring leader with three markers and Lehterä won the scoring stats with four points (2+2). Lehterä was also named Best Forward while Engren won the Best Goalkeeper award. Russia’s Andrei Zubarev was named Best Defenceman.

The other teams ended the tournament with one win each with Russia being ranked second followed by Sweden and the Czech Republic.

For Russia the tournament was mostly about identifying remaining players on the potential roster for the 2014 Olympics on home ice in Sochi beside the NHLers and a couple of KHL stars whose participation are more or less set, and scout players in view of the 2014 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in Minsk, Belarus. Yegor Averin, who has never played a World Championship for the men’s national team, led the Russians in scoring with two markers. The other goal came from Yevgeni Kuznetsov.