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ICE HOCKEY

Bern wins 13th national hockey championship

SC Bern clinched Switzerland’s ice hockey league A championship for the 13th time on Tuesday night with a decisive 5-1 victory over Fribourg-Gottéron on home ice.

Bern wins 13th national hockey championship
Bern's hockey team celebrates win. Photo: Swiss National League

The win gave the team from the Swiss capital a 4-2 edge in playoff games to capture the cup.

For Fribourg the loss marked the fourth time since 1992 that the team has had to settle for runner-up status in playoff finals.

Bern’s captain Martin Pluss opened the scoring in the 11th minute of the first period and his team never looked in doubt for the rest of the game.

By the end of the second period Bern led 3-0.

Fribourg, hampered by injuries, tallied one goal in the third period but Bern responded by putting the puck in the net twice in the game’s dying seconds.

The victory was sweet vengeance for the capital team after they lost in last year’s playoff final to the Zurich Lions.

Meanwhile, fans in Lausanne whooped it up in another playoff game on Tuesday night that saw the home team beat the Langnau Tigers 3-2.

The win means that Lausanne HC won the best of seven series four games to two and will be promoted to the A league next year after an absence of eight years.

The team from the Vaud capital, which won the B league playoffs last month, was matched against the Tigers, the last placed team in the A league, who will now be relegated to the B league after 15 years in the top division.

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ICE HOCKEY

Sweden beat Swiss to win ice hockey world title in shoot-out drama

Sweden retained their world championship title with a dramatic penalty shoot-out victory over plucky Switzerland in Copenhagen on Sunday.

Sweden beat Swiss to win ice hockey world title in shoot-out drama
Swiss players react after the defeat to Sweden. Photo: AFP

Filip Forsberg of the NHL's Nashville Predators scored the winning penalty as Sweden came back from 1-0 down in the shoot-out to win 2-1 following a 2-2 draw after overtime.

Surprise finalists Switzerland had been aiming for their first ever world title, while Sweden claimed an 11th crown.

Sweden had been the only unbeaten team through the group stage while Switzerland scraped into the quarter-finals with the weakest record.

But they stunned Group B winners Finland and then Canada to take their place in a third world championship final.

Five years ago they had lost to Sweden, who beat them 5-3 in the group stages too.

Switzerland twice took the lead, in each of the first two periods, but were pegged back by the favourites before the end of each stanza.

Minnesota Wild's Nino Niederreiter had given them a 16th minute lead but Gustav Nyquist of the Detroit Red Wings equalised a minute later.

On 23 minutes Timo Meier of the San Jose Sharks put the underdogs in front again, but that was wiped out by New York Ranger Mika Zibanejad on 34 minutes.

With no scores in either the third period or overtime, the final was decided by a shoot-out where Switzerland once again took the lead.

But Oliver Ekman-Larsson cancelled out Sven Andrighetto's successful strike, allowing Forsberg to become the hero.

Christopher Kreider of the Rangers scored twice as the United States thumped Canada 4-1 to take the bronze medal.

 After Kreider opened the scoring, Marc-Edouard Vlasic of the Sharks equalised.

But goals from Nashville's Nicholas Bonino and Anders Lee of the New York Islanders put the US in charge before Kreider rounded out the win.