By anyone’s measure, the team wasn’t almost good enough, and its showing likely will prompt change within USA Hockey.
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Along the way, Lombardi blamed himself for plenty.
When the Americans took the ice, they still were feeling the sting of a 4-2 defeat to Canada on Tuesday night that ended their hopes of doing any damage at the World Cup. But Lombardi defended the decision not to take more skilled players like Phil Kessel because he believes the US couldn’t match Canada’s depth of talent so it tried to win the tournament another way.
Team USA celebrate a power-play goal by Joe Pavelski #8 during the first period against Petr Mrazek #34 of Team Czech Republic at the World Cup of Hockey tournament at the Air Canada Centre on September 22, 2016 in Toronto. In the other semifinal, Sweden will play Team Europe on Sunday.
Kessel dropped his own passive-aggressive tweet in the middle of it all, clearly criticizing the Team USA roster-builders while the team struggled to generate any offense without him during the global tournament.
Before the game, US general manager Dean Lombardi didn’t back down from the team he, his management group and coach John Tortorella selected and the style they chose to play in the wake of heavy criticism.
“The one thing I’ll say, this is the number one thing I want: Give me 22 guys that care”, Lombardi said. “If you’re talking about Justin Abdelkader, Blake Wheeler, Brandon Dubinsky, Ryan Kesler, David Backes, I’ll take those guys any day, any day”, Lombardi said. And it’s why the United States failed to advance past the preliminary round in an global best-on-best tournament for the first time since the 1987 Canada Cup. “(But) I don’t understand players who have been in this situation, players who have played for USA Hockey, not only Phil (Kessel), but others, speaking out”. But he’s exhausted of the second-guessing about roster decisions. I think we’re going to be remembering this for a long time. While Canada, Sweden, Europe and Russian Federation prepare for the semifinals this weekend, the US and Czech Republic played out the string in front of a half-empty arena.
They picked up three regulation wins and finished as the top seed in Group A. As a result, they will play Russian Federation, the second-place team in Group B, on Saturday.
Previous losses to Team Europe and Canada eliminated the US from contention, and its round-robin finale had no meaning for either team. “We predicted that the competition would be better than any global tournament to date, that it would have a big-event feel”. They only needed to beat Europe and the Czech Republic to advance and get another crack at Canada, but they fell out of the gate.
The fact these two players were denied a chance at one last moment wearing their country’s colors was a shame, simply another thread in the ugly tapestry woven by this team at this most forgettable of tournaments.
Line juggling prevented the Americans from developing any real chemistry.
Team Canada clinched the top spot in Group A behind Toews’ two-goal performance in a 4-1 victory over Team Europe on Wednesday night.
But in the opening round, both teams got a chance at payback, and both took it. “I think just even the name, you kind of just said, ‘Ah, let’s get through this and get to these guys'”. National Hockey League players didn’t participate at the Olympics and the annual World Championships featured a smattering of National Hockey League talent from the few teams out of the playoffs.
Pavelski, who scored the first USA goal Thursday, says he regrets that bronze medal defeat.
“We’ve just got to slow ourselves down and dissect what’s happened”, he said. “Our thoughts were right at Canada”.
“We’ve definitely turned heads and definitely brought attention to our team and our group”, said McDavid.
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“You guys can say all you want, but within the room we know how we could’ve played, how we should’ve played and are regretting how we did play”. You have to make adjustments.
