My apologies for not posting the other semifinal result, but I’ve been dealing with a nasty flu bug — I’m seriously wondering if I have “it” — and I didn’t even get to follow the Canada-Sweden game.

Regardless, as you might already know, Canada beat Sweden 3-1 to set up a gold-medal game against Russia on Sunday. Drew Doughty played a team-high 22 minutes, 10 seconds, for Canada.

So it will be Canada vs. Russia for gold and the United States vs. Sweden for bronze.

Hopefully next week, I’ll be able to catch up with some of the Kings who participated in the tournament and get their thoughts…

Russia defeated the United States 3-2 this morning to advance to gold-medal game of the IIHF World Championships. Dustin Brown scored a second-period goal to give the U.S. a 1-0 lead, but Alexander Frolov scored later in the period to put Russia up 2-1. Team USA tied it late in the second on a goal by Kyle Okposo, and the game-winning goal came with Russia’s Konstantin Gorovikov scored on the power play with 1:47 remaining.

Russia advances to face either Canada or Sweden for gold, while the U.S. will play the lose of that semifinal game for bronze.

It’s been a pretty successful World Championships tournament for Kings participants. Drew Doughty joined Dustin Brown, Peter Harrold, Jack Johnson and Alexander Frolov in the semifinals when Canada beat Latvia 4-2 this morning.

Doughty had an assist on Dan Hamhuis’ second-period power-play goal, which made it 2-0 Canada. Canada went on to lead 3-1 and 4-2 and advances to tomorrow’s semifinals to face either Sweden or the Czech Republic (that game is at 11:15 a.m. today)

Dustin Brown scored a power-play goal to held Team USA to a 3-2 victory over Finland and a trip to the semifinals of the World Championships. USA trailed 1-0 when Brown scored 10:31 into the second period to tie it. USA got two more second-period goals and held on in a scoreless third period.

Team USA will play Alexander Frolov and Russia in a semifinal game Friday at 7:15 a.m. Pacific time.

Drew Doughty and Team Canada play a quarterfinal game tomorrow morning against Latvia.

The Kansas City Star reported today that the Kings will play their exhibition game in Kansas City, against the New York Islanders, on Tuesday, Sept. 22. Tickets are not yet on sale.

It will be interesting to see if Kansas City starts sniffing around the bankrupt Coyotes…

Alexander Frolov scored a goal this morning to help Russia to a 4-3 victory over Belarus and a spot in the semifinals of the IIHF World Championships in Switzerland.

Frolov scored a second-period goal to put Russia up 3-2. Belarus tied the game a couple minutes later, but Ilya Kovalchuk scored a third-period goal and the Russians held on.

Russia will play the winner of the USA-Finland quarterfinal, which starts at 11:15 a.m. Pacific time and, apparently, is going to be streamed live at universalsports.com, with Nick Nickson and Daryl Evans doing the commentary.

There was a question earlier about whether the Kings will be hosting a “draft party” this year, similar to the one they held at Nokia Theater last year and at Hollywood and Highland the year before. The short answer is, no. There will be a “watch party” on the afternoon of June 26 at the new ESPN Zone across the street from Staples Center, for the first round, but it’s not an event officially sponsered by the Kings.

Why? It’s sort of a two-part answer, I’m told. One, to put it simply, the Kings don’t want it to be pereived that they’re “celebrating” a high draft pick every year, because obviously you only get a high draft pick when your season didn’t go well. The attitude is that the Kings want to “graduate” from that and want to change that perception. The other part is, the Kings are putting their summer focus on the Hockey Fest event that’s coming up in August. Details of that event are expected to be released over the next few weeks, but initial details can be found here.

The quarterfinals are set for the IIHF World Championships…

WEDNESDAY
Russia vs. Belarus, 7:15 a.m. (Pacific)
Finland vs. USA, 11:15 a.m.

THURSDAY
Canada vs. Latvia, 7:15 a.m.
Sweden vs. Czech Republic, 11:15 a.m.

The semifinals will be played Friday, with the bronze- and gold-medal games on Sunday.

For Team USA, Jack Johnson has four goals and two assists in six games and is averaging a team-high 20 minutes, 45 seconds, of ice time. Dustin Brown has one goal and five assists and Peter Harrold is scoreless in three games.

For Russia, Alexander Frolov has one goal and one assist in four games. For Slovakia, Michal Handzus has a team-high four assists in six games.

And yes, since I forgot young Mr. Doughty, he has one goal and five assists in six games for Canada.

Andrei Loktionov, the Kings’ fifth-round draft pick last year, is having a great run in the OHL playoffs for the WIndsor Spitfires. Windsor is in the Ontario Hockey League finals against Brampton and leads the series 2-1, with Game 4 to be played Wednesday.

Loktionov has three goals and three assists in the series, and has nine goals and 21 assists in 18 playoff games overall. Loktionov, who turns 19 this month, was named the league’s player of the week on Tuesday.

The series also features Brampton’s Matt Duchene, who is expected to be one of the top three or four picks in next month’s NHL Draft. Duchene has one goal and two assists in the series.

Team USA will play its final game in the qualifying round in just a few minutes, against Switzerland. The Americans have already qualified for the quarterfinals but can improve their standing with a victory.

In weekend games, Team USA beat France 6-2 on Friday but lost to Russia 4-1 on Saturday. The Kings’ contingent was held scoreless against Russia, but against France, Jack Johnson had a goal and Dustin Brown had an assist. Johnson is now tied for the team lead with four goals and is second on the team with six points. Brown is second on the team with five assists.