OTTAWA - One was expected to be there, the other not so much.

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Slovakia celebrates their third goal against the USA during first period action during the play-off round quarterfinals of the World Junior Championship held at Scotiabank Place in Ottawa, Canada, January 02, 2009.

Photograph by : Ottawa Citizen

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Regardless, traditional power Russia and surprising Slovakia are off to the semifinals of the IIHF world junior hockey tournament.

Russia beat the Czech Republic 5-1 in the quarter-finals Friday night, hours after Slovakia pulled the biggest upset of the tournament so far - knocking off the United States 5-3.

Russia faces Canada on Saturday night in one semifinal, while Slovakia play Sweden in the other.

Jaroslav Janus was the hero for Slovakia - even if means he won't be as popular in Erie, Pa., as he was when he left a couple of weeks ago.

The star goalie of the Ontario Hockey League's Erie Otters almost single-handedly eliminated a heavily favoured U.S. team from medal contention in a shocking 5-3 upset.

Janus, who was the Otters' MVP last year despite a losing record of 13-29-3, stopped 46 shots to lead Slovakia.

"This was the best game of my life . . . unbelievable," said Janus, a 19-year-old who has not yet been drafted by a NHL club. "Oh no. I wasn't thinking (about Erie). Maybe I can't go back. Maybe they're not going to like me (in Erie). I hadn't thought about that."

The competition won't get any easier for Janus as the Swedes will be just as heavily favoured over Slovakia as the Americans were.

The loss ended a string of six straight trips to the tournament semifinals for the Americans, who seemed unable to shed the hangover of the emotional New Year's Eve loss to Team Canada. Instead, they will play for fifth place.

Adam Bezak opened the scoring at 11:05 of the first period, but a power-play goal by Ian Cole a minute later evened the score.

But it didn't change the momentum.

Tomas Tatar beat U.S. goalie Thomas McCollum with a backhand at 13:41 and Jozef Molnar made the score 3-1 at 17:03.

With the Slovaks scoring three goals on eight shots, many in the crowd of 18,042 were yelling "shoot" every time a Slovakia player touched the puck, regardless of where he was on the ice.

The Americans outshot the Slovaks 16-2 in the second period but had nothing to show for it.

The teams exchanged goals in the third period before Tatar iced it with an empty-net goal at 17:46.

Against the Czech Republic, Russia used a four-goal outburst in the third period to break open a close game.

"Tonight we paid more attention to defence," said Russian captain Nikita Filatov. "In the second period, we didn't play very well. We stopped skating. But in the third, we played more the way we wanted to."

The Russians came to the game with their confidence shaken after a 5-0 loss to Sweden on New Year's Eve, and it showed. They had difficulty stringing passes together and they rarely got into a rhythm.

The Czechs came into this game as heavy underdogs and were never able to generate any serious offence. The Czechs outshot Russia 14-7 in the second period, but Russian goaltender Vadim Zhelobnyuk stood tall.

Russia got goals from Sergei Andronov, Filatov, Evgeni Grachev, Evgeni Dadonov and Pavel Chernov. Radko Gudas replied for the Czechs.

In Friday's other game, Roberts Bukarts recorded the hat-trick and added a third-period assist in as Latvia beat Germany 7-1. Latvia can clinch a spot at the 2010 world junior tournament in Saskatoon and Regina with a win over lowly Kazakhstan, or if Germany loses to Finland. Both games are Sunday.