Furious Canadian comeback falls short in world juniors
Posted January 4, 2012 6:06 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Canada’s world junior hockey team will try for the bronze medal, after narrowly being defeated by the Russians in a gut-wrenching semi-final match.
The Canadian team fell 6-5, breaking a 10-year streak of advancing to the gold medal match.
Canadian coach Don Hay said everyone is taking the loss hard, after a desperate rally brought the team back from a 6-1 deficit.
“It was a game that we really wanted to play well in and have the opportunity to move on, and that’s no longer there,” Hay said. “Now our focus is on playing well against Finland and getting the bronze medal.”
Perhaps making the loss even more difficult is the fact that the game could have served as an opportunity for the juniors to wipe out the memory of last year’s gold medal collapse against the Russian team.
“You’ve got to play sixty minutes, you can’t just have a final push at the end,” said Canadian player Brett Connolly. “We battled back hard and we had chances to tie it up.”
Russia will play Sweden for the gold medal on Thursday at 8 p.m., while Canada will square-off with Finland for the bronze at 3 p.m.
Going into the game, both teams had looked good, with Russia winning three of four games in the opening round, outscoring opponents 23-5. Canada won all four of their games, putting up 26 goals against their opponents.
