Notebook: Jaroslav Halak named Team Europe's starter

WASHINGTON -- Coach Ralph Krueger hinted after the morning skate Wednesday that Jaroslav Halak would be Team Europe's No. 1 goaltender when the World Cup of Hockey 2016 gets underway in Toronto this weekend.

After Halak's 34-save performance against Team Sweden in its final pretournament game, Krueger confirmed Halak won the job.

Halak is joined by New York Islanders teammate Thomas Greiss and Philipp Grubauer as Team Europe's goalies.

"It would be silly to play any type of games around anything," Krueger said. "The way Jaro has come into this camp, into his games, the professionalism … we're of course pleased to see him have that kind of a game tonight."

YOUNG FORWARD RESPONDS: Leon Draisaitl played 5:30 in a pretournament game against Team North America on Sunday. It didn't sit well with him.

But the 20-year-old responded in a big way Wednesday, scoring a hat trick in the 6-2 win against Team Sweden.

Draisaitl was held without a point and had a minus-3 rating in Team Europe's first two pretournament games. But with Wednesday being his team's final tuneup before it plays Team USA at Air Canada Centre in Toronto on Saturday (3:30 p.m. ET; ESPN2, SN, TVA Sports), Draisaitl felt it was important to have a good performance after he received limited ice time in a 7-4 loss Sunday.

"I think it's pretty easy to get motivated for those kinds of games, for this tournament," Draisaitl said. "I didn't play very much the last game, so I had to make sure I'm ready to go off the bat, and I think our whole line played a pretty solid game. It was a good bounce-back for me."

Krueger agreed.

"Under the circumstances, outstanding," Krueger said. "He had very little ice time in the second half of the last game, and our coaching staff spent a lot of time with him, especially [assistant coach] Paul Maurice did a really long video session with him yesterday. When you see this type of reaction, he could've easily laid down and quit and, no, he came back fighting.

"It's the character of our team. We're an underdog team built with underdog countries, and an individual like Leon is just a great example of the little nuances that are happening within our life as a group. Very pleased for Leon to react the way he did. We're a dangerous team. We've got a lot of players that can score, and it makes us lethal if we can play good defense and get the goaltending we got today from [Halak]."

via WCH2016.com.