Eric Lindros
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LINDROS HIGHLIGHTS 1991 WJHC ON TEAM CANADA

The 1991 World Junior Hockey Championship was highlighted by two emerging superstars whose names would come to dominate the National Hockey league throughout the 1990s.

Canada's team was led by Eric Lindros, a phenom with a future so bright he was dubbed "The Next One" before he even finished his junior career.

A towering physical presence, Lindros was a man among boys and was so dominant that he would play in the 1991 Canada Cup before even lacing up for an NHL game.

His chief rival was a young Russian whose skill was already the stuff of World Junior legend.

At 19, Pavel Bure had already won World Junior gold for the Soviet Union to go along with the tournament's Best Forward Award (won as a 17-year-old in 1989), an IIHF World Championship gold (won in 1990) and would score a staggering 27 goals at the World Juniors by the end of the 1991 tournament.

And the two stars would clash in each team's final round robin game of the tournament with the gold medal on the line.

The Soviets entered the game needing only a tie to seal the gold, nursing a 5-0-1 record. Canada meanwhile, needed a victory after having tied the Americans and lost to Czechoslovakia.

What happened on Jan. 4, 1991 became one of the moments that would forever go down in World Junior lore and one man's name would become synonymous with the result.

John Slaney.

The Soviets looked primed to win the gold with the game deadlocked at 2-2 late in the third period, but Slaney would unleash a long slapper late in the period to turn the tide and the tournament in Canada's favour.

While Lindros and Bure would go on to become NHL superstars, Slaney's impact in the league would be minimal.

Despite being a first-round draft choice of the Washington Capitals in 1990, he would never play a full NHL season, despite suiting up for 268 regular season games.

Still, his performance against the Soviet Union in 1991 forever etched his name on the history of the World Junior Championship.