With Germany beaten, Canada turns sights on U.S.
Americans have been looking forward to New Year's Eve for months
Last Updated: Tuesday, December 30, 2008 | 12:09 AM ET
By Alan Adams CBC News
Team Canada's Zach Boychuk tries to get one past German goalie Philipp Grubauer in the first period on Monday. Grubauer played well in the 5-1 loss. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)It was a warm day in August when Thomas McCollum circled Dec. 31 in his daytimer.
McCollum didn't write anything beside the date because he knew exactly what was on tap.
The United States plays Canada at the world junior hockey championship and the U.S. netminder can't think of a better way to ring in 2009 than by beating Canada on home soil in the country's capital city.
"As soon as I got to the summer [training] camp, everybody, including me, looked at when we would play Canada," said McCollum, who plays for the Guelph Storm of the Ontario Hockey League.
"That's the first thing I looked for, when we play Canada."
It was pretty much the same drill for Pat Quinn when he took over as head coach of the national junior team in the summer.
Quinn had barely agreed to take his 10th assignment for Hockey Canada when officials told him the Americans were building a team to stop the Canadians from winning a fifth straight world junior championship.
For all intents and purpose, the world junior championship begins in earnest on Wednesday.
The preliminary round games, which include Tuesday's potential yawner of a game between the United States and Kazakhstan, are a warmup act for the intense action that will soon take place.
Canada ran its record to 3-0 on Monday with a 5-1 win over Germany.
The U.S. is 2-0 and will also have three wins under its belt by the time the North American rivals line up on opposite blue-lines on New Year's Eve.
Whoever wins gets a bye to the semifinals, while the loser advances to the quarterfinals on Friday, and will have to play three games in four days if they hope to mine gold on Canadian soil come Monday when the championship game is slated.
It's the same on the other side of the 10-team tournament. Russia and Sweden will both be undefeated when they square off Wednesday afternoon, with the same carrot on the stick for the winner.
If nothing else, the Germans gave the Canadians a game and the Canadians were nursing a one-goal lead when they erupted for three goals in the third.
The good news for Quinn is the power play continues to carry the Canadian offence. They scored four times against the Germans and half of Canada's offence (14 goals) have come with the man advantage.
But you have to figure in a 15-0 win over Kazakhstan in considering how many even-strength goals the Canadians have produced.
Quinn conceded that five-on-five, the Canadians have to do better.
"Our sniping could be better," he said.
Back to the Americans.
Russia not the top rival
There is no doubt that the United States has replaced Russia as Canada's top rival, at least for a generation or two of Canadians.
The rivalry was rekindled by the U.S. winning the World Cup of Hockey in 1996, but Canada extracted revenge by winning Olympic gold in Salt Lake City in 2002.
The U.S. beat Canada in the gold medal game of the 2004 world junior championship in Finland, and the Canada-United States semifinal in at the 2007 world junior in Sweden was one for the ages.
It went to sudden death, with Jonathan Toews scoring a third shootout goal for Canada and Carey Price making the save on the final U.S. shooter to secure the win.
The rivalry is here to stay.
It's how you play against Canada
For the Americans, Canada is the measuring stick for success, and members of the host team wants to keep distance between them and the U.S.
"We are getting a deeper pool of players to choose from and we are getting to that point [where we are even with Canada],'' says U.S. head coach Ron Rolston, whose brother Brian plays in the NHL.
"It is a process and obviously Canada has the strong tradition year in and year out and our goal is to put some of that together, that consistency, before we make a huge leap and put gold [medals] together for that matter."
It's not as if the Canadians needed to be reminded of what is at stake, but Prime Minister Stephen Harper is scheduled to visit with them on Tuesday, pose for a few pictures and go from there.
"It is a big thrill for the players," said Quinn. "But park it [the visit] and put it where it belongs. Let's get it done."
