US blanks Germany, Russia routs Belarus at ice hockey worlds

HERNING, Denmark (AP) The United States beat Germany 3-0 to stay unbeaten and Russia shut out a third straight opponent at the world ice hockey championship on Monday.

Russia routed Belarus 6-0.

Canada allowed Denmark to score on the way to another big win, 7-1, and defending champion Sweden kept cruising with a 4-0 win against France.

U.S. captain Patrick Kane broke the deadlock against Germany and assisted on the other two goals in the hard-fought Group B game in Herning.

Germany goalie Niklas Treutle didn't allow the U.S. to score from 11 shots on goal in the first period. Treutle's teammates also killed three penalties in the second period. Kane finally made the breakthrough midway through the game on another power play with a one-timer to the roof of the net.

''It was a great pass from Johnny (Gaudreau), it was fun to be on the receiving end of that one,'' Kane said.

''It was a big goal. Zero-zero against a team like Germany that came out really strong and they kind of hanged around there.''

Just over two minutes later, Derek Ryan added an insurance goal also on a power play. In the final period, Kane found his NHL teammate Alex DeBrincat in front of the net for the third goal.

''It's awesome to play with (Kane),'' DeBrincat said. ''He gets so many chances in a game. It's pretty hard not to score.''

U.S. goalie Keith Kinkaid stopped 24 shots for his second straight shutout.

It was the third consecutive defeat for Germany, the runner- up at the Pyeongchang Olympics.

Joshua Bailey opened the scoring for Canada with a wrister on a power play, and defensemen Aaron Ekbland netted with a slap shot in the first period.

Jordan Eberle, Ryan O'Reilly and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins stretch the lead to 5-0 within a three-minute span.

Nugent-Hopkins, again, and Tyson Jost completed the scoring in the final period when Jesper Jensen Aabo scored Denmark's lone goal to delight the home crowd.

''Playing Denmark in Denmark, it was a lot of fun,'' Nugent-Hopkins said. ''The crowd, the atmosphere was sure loud and really intense to start.''

Captain Connor McDavid finished with three assists.

For Sweden, Rickard Rakell, Mikael Backlund, Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Elias Pettersson scored against France to earn their third straight victory and keep pace with Russsia in Group A.

Veteran captain Pavel Datsyuk led the high-scoring Russians with two goals against Belarus in Copenhagen.

Maxim Shalunov, Ilya Kablukov, Maxim Mamin and Kirill Kaprizov also scored. Russia has 20 goals in three games.