Minsk, Belarus (SportsNetwork.com) - The Czech Republic beat the United States by a 4-3 margin in the quarterfinals of the 2014 World Hockey Championship on Thursday.
The game's turning point occurred 6:41 into the second period, with the score tied 1-1. USA captain Justin Abdelkader received a five-minute charging penalty and was ejected from the contest for a big hit on forward Vladimir Sobotka. Tomas Hertl and Roman Cervenka scored during the five-minute power play.
Ondrej Nemec added a power-play goal late in the middle stanza to make it 4-1.
The USA got a pair of goals from Tyler Johnson within a 13-second span late in the third, but the Americans failed to get the tying goal past Czech goaltender Alexander Salak.
Salak made 31 saves for the Czechs, who will play Canada or Finland in the semifinals on Saturday.
Tim Thomas stopped 29-of-33 shots for the Americans, who won a bronze medal at last year's tournament.
Alexander Ovechkin returned to the lineup and Russia handled France, 3-0, in the second quarterfinal of the day.
Ovechkin hurt his right knee in the third period of Russia's preliminary-round game against Germany on Sunday. He was hospitalized for a short time but an MRI revealed no ligament damage.
Evgeni Malkin, Alexander Kutuzov and Artem Anisimov scored for the Russians, who got 16 saves from Sergei Bobrovsky.
Russia, which won all seven of its matches during the preliminary round, will face either defending champion Sweden or Belarus in the semifinals.
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