The title of this post was the title of a story in one of the major newspapers in Toronto this morning (the Toronto Star I believe) about Team Canada’s 4-2 victory over Finland in their qualification game at the 2008 IIHF World U20 Hockey Championship. With this win the Canadians face an unbeaten Team USA Friday afternoon to decide who will go on to play in the Gold medal game.
Ordinarily, I wouldn’t give a second thought to a headline but when a team wins in a game it never should have played in, I don’t see how anyone in Canada or any Canadian involved in or following the tournament can be jumping for joy. With the talent of the players on this team, they should have gone undefeated throughout the round robin to earn a bye into the semi-finals. Don’t get me wrong, I am glad they won and hope they can muster enough to beat what could be the best junior team to ever come out of the USA and get the chance to play for gold but I just don’t see how anyone can be overly excited by the win.
I am not trying to take anything away from Finland but to me the game was nothing more than a formality. I just hope that Team Canada used this extra game to correct the mistakes from their loss to Sweden and iron out any remaining wrinkles because they will be facing two more tough teams in the USA and either Russia or Sweden (for either the Gold or Bronze medal) and if they hope to bring a medal back to Canada, they need to be at their best. Go Canada!
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