DAY #8 SPORTS FOCUS: USA Hockey defeats North American nemesis Canada, 4-2, in 100-year-old Olympic rivalry

Sidney Crosby’s “golden” overtime goal in Vancouver 2010, the tale of the infamous Canadian Loonie covertly frozen into center ice for good luck at Salt Lake 2002 as Canada defeated the U.S. for gold, and a hard-fought affair in the Sochi 2014 semifinal, in which the Canadians eliminated the Americans 1-0 en route to gold, are all memorable Olympic contests that have scripted the lopsided history between the two nations.

It is a rivalry that dates back more than 100 years to the first Olympic hockey tournament at the Antwerp 1920 Games – yes, contested at the Summer Olympics – at which Canada beat the U.S. in the gold medal game, 2-0.

But Saturday in Beijing at China’s National Indoor Stadium, it was a tenacious, youthful U.S. squad, led by goaltender Strauss Mann, who denied 35 of 37 Canadian shots-on-goal, including all 17 in the third period, while Captain Andy Miele contributed the team’s first goal and later a beautiful assist, the duo leading the U.S. past Canada 4-2 in preliminary round action.

National Hockey League stars may be home in North America, but the two predominantly young squads played a physical, entertaining, Olympic-worthy game, with compelling end-to-end action.

Canada’s Mat Robinson opening the scoring just 1:25 into the contest, a weak goal that trickled between Mann’s pads, but after the miscue, the 23-year-old University of Michigan goalie excelled between the pipes.

“The first one went in, I don’t know how, but I’m proud of how I regrouped and stuck with it and I think that showed,” Mann said, after the victory, in which he stopped 35 Canadian shots.

U.S. captain Andy Miele scored on Canadian netminder Eddie Pasquale, just 70 seconds later, to knot the game at 1-1.

“To put a stop to their momentum right away was awesome,” Miele said.

Fast forward to the third period as U.S. forward Kenny Agostino beat Pasquale with a blistering slapshot six minutes in to provide the U.S. with some insurance and a 4-2 lead. The U.S. defenders clamped down after that, killing off a late 5-on-3 power play and surviving an extra attacker in the waning minutes, as Mann was stellar in net to secure victory over their neighbors to the north.

“We were blocking shots, competing – I thought our guys did a really good job competing, especially at the end with the 5-on-3, 5-on-4, that’s hard, they played smart and that was key,” Mann said.

Canadian captain Eric Staal touched upon his team’s frustrating 17-shot barrage in the third period, none of which found the back of the twine.

“We had enough chances to score, there were a lot of looks around the crease and if we do that we’ll score some goals on the power play, but sometimes they don’t fall for you,” Staal said.

The victory was the first time that the U.S. defeated Canada at the Olympics since Vancouver 2010 preliminary round action, by the score of 5-3.

Saturday’s game in Beijing also marked the 19th Olympic contest between the two countries, Canada still holding a commanding 12-4 advantage, despite the U.S. win, including three ties.

Team USA is comprised of 15 collegiate players, five from the Russian KHL and others from North American minor leagues. Their Canadian opponents took the ice with eight KHL players, and a similar blend of collegiate, junior and minor leaguers.

Despite the lack of marquee NHL players, the team’s two coaches are high profile names. Canada’s Claude Julien led the Boston Bruins to a 2011 Stanley Cup title and U.S. coach David Quinn was recently behind the bench for the New York Rangers.

Despite the early success and heavily tilted U.S. collegiate roster, as was entirely the case with the U.S. 1980 Lake Placid gold medal winning team, Strauss said he is not yet quite ready for “Miracle on Ice” comparisons.

“I definitely grew up watching that, I think all the guys did, we have a lot of college guys, I don’t know if it’s the same, but we have chance though,” said the U.S. goalie, who must be referring to YouTube, considering that he was born 18 years after the Lake Placid miracle.

“I guess it is a little similar with all these college guys – that was a great moment in American hockey history and we have a long way to go, but hopefully it will be the same,” said U.S. forward Sean Farrell, who plays college hockey for Harvard.

The Americans, having defeated China 8-0 in their opener, improved their record to 2-0 to take command of the Group A standings, which also includes PyeongChang 2018 silver medalists Germany.

The Americans will square off next with Germany on Sunday, while Canada will throw the kitchen sink at a determined, but obviously, highly over-matched Chinese team.

“If you can’t enjoy this then why did we come – so we enjoy this game and then reset,” said U.S. head coach David Quinn. “The Germany game, well both games are worth the same amount of points, unless I missed something.”

Do you believe it or not, yet one more U.S. player was asked about the “Miracle on Ice,” to which captain Miele responded: “We still have a ways to go for that one.”

Miracles, for the moment, will have to wait until another day.

Italian downhill skier Goggia back on track, Russians win cross-country relay

The 2018 Olympic downhill champion Sofia Goggia, recovering from a nasty crash suffered in Cortina d’Ampezzo a few weeks, has passed the test and she’s ready to race at the Beijing Winter Olympic Games.

Goggia, who suffered a minor knee injury, skied in Saturday’s opening women’s downhill training run, with a accomplishing what she needed wiht 12th place result on the 2.7-kilometer “The Rock” course.

“I am glad I could ski well today, and I am glad I could be at the start gate because it wasn’t guaranteed at all after what occurred in Cortina around 15 days ago,” Goggia said.

“I’m really happy to be here, I’m happy to be at the Games, so let’s play!”

ln this afternoon’s cross-country women’s 4x5km relay, skiers representing the ROC raced to gold.

Yulia Stupak, Natalia Nepryaeva (both skiing classic), Tatiana Sorina, and Veronika Stepanova (both skiing freestyle) clinched the victory in 53 minutes 41.0 seconds.

Germany took silver and Sweden the bronze.

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