This lead to New York Rangers’ defenseman Ryan McDonagh scoring the opening goal of the game on Team USA’s first shot, which came in the first five minutes of the first period.
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Within 24 hours they’re going from playing a heated rival, which they knocked out of the tournament, to facing a team that’s never existed before this tournament.
Last night the Canadian team embarrassed the “gritty” Team USA in a 4-2 skills clinic that eliminated the Americans from the tournament.
That means there are still spots up for grabs – between Team North America, Sweden, Finland and Russian Federation – and a whole lot of jockeying for seeding. The idea that this roster was specifically built to match up to win against the tournament favorite seems to make sense on the surface. The issue with that methodology is probably best explained in the old phrase that the best defense is a good offense. The tweet – and one made by the Ottawa Senators’ Bobby Ryan – made an impact with Team USA players, who responded Wednesday in Toronto. The puck hit Corey Perry, who was crashing the net, and in.
Team Canada are now listed as -695 favorites to win tonight’s game, and Team Europe are listed as +485 underdogs on Sports Interaction’s World Cup of Hockey odds. “Now we’ve got to do it though”. Among those left off the roster were forwards Phil Kessel, Paul Stastny and Kyle Okposo, and defensemen Justin Faulk and Kevin Shattenkirk. But the lineup as assembled had some pretty big finishers who just didn’t show up, and that might be the biggest issue of all. It could be one of those games where Team Canada slowly chips away at the European lead and finally takes control late in the third – or as mentioned above, OT victory. The fact is those are just excuses that they rode to their demise.
Speaking about the backlash on social media toward Team USA in general, with Kessel in mind, forward David Backes found it troubling. I don’t think he could even play, anyway. Last night, if we wanted to go into full analysis of it, it’s a shot off the back board that goes to Duchene and he’s tapping it in.
A few days isn’t enough time to answer all those questions, especially for players whose job was to play a certain style of hockey not put together a roster or pick the coaching staff.
Good teams don’t make excuses they go out and make it right, they go out and fight. And to make matters worse they chose to nearly make it seem like the situations that led to these two losses were not their fault. Hindsight is a thing for the pundits and you get to second-guess everybody but in their heart of hearts they said this is the way we’re going to win.
“But now we’re set up to play more games in the tournament, which is real positive”.
The Americans still have one round-robin game left, Thursday against the similarly lame-duck Czech Republic. “But there’s a lot of growth in this game for us”.
How deep is Team Canada at the World Cup of Hockey?
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PRICE PERFECT: Price hasn’t allowed a goal in worldwide competition in 224:19, counting the World Cup opener and the semifinal and final at the 2014 Sochi Olympics.
