This is what it’s all about. Two more games to decide the medals at the 2026 IIHF U18 Men’s World Championship – and history to be written in Trencin. Read on for all you need to know about Saturday’s medal games.

Gold-medal game: Slovakia vs Sweden, 19:00
It’s been a party atmosphere in Slovakia all week, but the celebrations if the host nation wins a first ever U18 gold would surely top the lot.

From a historic opening-night win over Canada to a tense semi-final success against Latvia, the Slovaks have ridden a huge wave of support to guarantee a first medal since silver in 2003.

Consistent scoring from Timothy Kazda, whose six goals lead the tournament and whose 10 points have him second to Sweden’s Elton Hermansson overall, might have caught the headlines. But it’s consistent solid defensive work – all over the ice – that has put Slovakia in this position.

“Our team is going so good, we are going 100% every game,” said goalie Samuel Hrenak. “We defend well, we play good in the offensive zone. We are just so good and I’m happy to be a part of this team.”

The semi-final success ended a run of three successive trips to the bronze game that ultimately left the Slovaks without hardware.

But defender Filip Kovalcik isn’t stopping yet.

“There’s still work to do,” he insisted. “This is a big moment for us, for our country, Slovakia.

“We’ll do everything for it, we’ll go 100% into the next game and I’m sure everybody on this team will work hard and help us win.”

And after finding ways to win in tough games along the way, the prospect of a strong Swedish opponent in the final doesn’t faze anyone.

“We are ready to play, we want to beat everybody,” Hrenak concluded. “We are so proud to be Slovakian. So happy, so grateful we can be here and doing such a good job.

“This tournament has been up and down, every team has played some really good games, and some not so good. Anything can happen. We’re just excited and we want to win.”

If a Slovak win is the popular choice, Sweden is pursuing a redemption arc in this tournament.

The preliminary round brought a chastening 1-9 loss to the USA – “I don’t know what happened; that wasn’t us,” in goalie Kevin Thorblom’s assessment – before things began to click. Since that day, the Tre Kronor enjoyed a 10-1 thrashing of Denmark, a 4-2 win to eliminate Canada in the quarter-finals and Friday night’s overtime thriller against Czechia.

Bonne Meijer, who grabbed the overtime winner against the Czechs, feels that there’s a sense of shared destiny here.

“I’ve been playing with this team for three years now, two years with the same coaching staff,” he said. “It’s always been the goal to play in for gold here, so of course it’s a big feeling.”

Alexander Command, who had two points in the win over Czechia, became a big part of the Swedish turnaround in Slovakia. After that USA defeat, he was asked to centre a new strike trio alongside Hermansson and Marcus Nordmark. Since that change, Sweden has 18 goals in three games.

“It’s been a good team effort,” he said. “We had a talk here last week, they asked us to come together as a team. Now all the guys are chipping in and doing their part. We’re a team.”

While Command’s line plundered 17 points in the last three games, there have been vital contributions from others. Nils Bartholdsson scored twice in the third period to secure a 4-2 verdict against Canada, then Meijer was the overtime hero against Slovakia. Meanwhile, Hermansson is well placed to finish the tournament as scoring leader. He goes into the gold-medal game on 11 (3+8) points, one ahead of Kazda.

Bronze-medal game: Czechia vs Latvia, 15:00
Whoever takes bronze will end a long U18 medal drought. Czechia has to go back to 2014 for its last hardware at this tournament, while Latvia has never finished on the podium at this level.

Latvia can look to its men’s team for inspiration. The Baltic nation got its first world championship medal in 2023, winning bronze as co-host. The significance of that achievement was not lost on the youngsters who watched Arturs Silovs backstop an unforgettable run.

“The men’s team have done it, so it needs the U18 and U20 teams to step up,” said forward Olivers Murnieks. “I think it’s maybe even harder for us, so if we can win bronze it would mean so much.”

Securing bronze would mean bouncing back from a deflating 0-1 loss to Slovakia in Friday’s semi-final, a game where Latvia struggled to generate offence from start to finish.

Murnieks is already consigning that to the past. “We have to forget about it and focus on a medal,” he said. “We need to play as a team, no egos on the team. We’ll help our goalie a lot, he’s going to be very important for us to win that game.”

Czechia, meanwhile, suffered its own heartache, blowing a 3-1 lead to fall to Sweden in overtime. The Czechs were never behind in the game until allowing a goal on 69:18 and the pain was clear.

“It’s hard to accept the loss,” said defender Ondrej Ruml. “We played one of our best games in this tournament but we just couldn’t get the win.

“But we can hold our heads high. It’s still a good achievement to play for the bronze medal. Now we need to win it.”

Throughout the tournament, Czechia had a habit of edging tight games: overtime against the USA, a 2-1 win over Sweden in the preliminary round, and another 2-1 verdict to beat Finland in the last eight. That kind of resilience could be key against Latvia.

But another defender, Jakub Vanecek, isn’t worried about detail. His message was simple: “We are going to win.”