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Canadians come up big in gold-medal win
By Zack Van Eyck
Deseret News Olympic specialist
WEST VALLEY CITY — They don't win every game against their arch-rivals, just the big ones.
The Canadian women's hockey team, losers of eight straight to the United States on the pre-Olympic tour, played its best game of the season Thursday night at the E Center and solidified its long-held status as the best team in the world.
The best, at least, when it really matters.
The Canadians outhustled, outshot, outmaneuvered and even outfinessed Team USA, keeping the Americans off-balance and out of sync throughout a 3-2 victory for the 2002 Olympic gold medal.
"This has been a long time coming," said team captain Cassie Campbell, a 28-year-old forward from Ontario. "The whole world's off our shoulders and we're so excited."
With its first Olympic title, Canada now has won 13 of the 15 gold medals awarded in sanctioned international play — including seven straight Women's World Championships — since the sport emerged on the international scene in 1990. The Americans' most impressive and most recent triumph remains the '98 gold medal in Nagano, when women's hockey debuted at the Games.
"This is the one we were missing so it feels really good to complete the set," said Canadian defenseman Therese Brisson, who assisted on the game-winning goal. "It just felt like this was our night."
Canada's shorthanded units worked tirelessly to kill a whopping 16 minutes of penalties, including a 5-on-3 disadvantage for more than a minute late in the first period. The Americans did score both of their goals on power plays, but Canada escaped with the win and plenty of complaints about the officiating.
"That referee tried to give them that game and we weren't going to let that happen," said Geraldine Heaney, a 34-year-old defenseman who was playing the final game of her Team Canada career. "We got an unbelievable number of penalties. We never had any idea that could happen."
Jayna Hefford scored what proved to be the game-winner on a breakaway with just one second left in the second period. Tournament MVP Hayley Wickenheiser, who carried her 2-year-old son onto the ice for the medal ceremony, and Caroline Ouellette added goals for Canada.
Team USA forwards Katie King and Karyn Bye, who tied for the team lead in scoring in the '98 Games, scored the U.S. goals. Team captain Cammi Granato was held scoreless, as was 18-year-old Natalie Darwitz, who had seven goals in the Americans' first four games.
"As you get older and more mature, it's easier to handle different situations," said Bye, one of three 30-year-olds on the American roster. "But as many sacrifices as this team has had, both individually and as a team, it hurts."
The last time Canada met the U.S. in a gold-medal game was last April in the World Championship final. Then, like Thursday, Canada took a 3-1 lead and survived a late U.S. goal to win 3-2. Then, like Thursday, goalie Kim St. Pierre turned in a strong performance in net. She had 33 saves in the world title game, 25 Thursday night. American Sara DeCosta, who watched teammate Sarah Tueting beat Canada in the gold-medal game in '98, made 26 saves in a losing cause.
"I'm not really shocked because Canada has what it takes to win and so do we," DeCosta said. "This is just the way the sport is, but you can't take anything away from Canada."
Sweden 2, Finland 1
At Provo, 15-year-old goalie Kim Martin stopped 32 of Finland's 33 shots and 17-year-old forward Evelina Samuelsson scored a pair of first-period goals as Sweden upset the Finns for the bronze medal. Finland had won the bronze in Nagano and in all seven Women's World Championships.
Martin also played extremely well two days earlier in a 4-0 semifinal loss to the U.S.
"This was her big chance to come out as a great goalie and she took the challenge," Team Sweden coach Christian Yngve said of Martin. "We got their power play not to produce. I think that was the key for us."
Samuelsson entered the game without a goal or assist in the Olympics.
E-mail: zman@desnews.com
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February 22, 2002
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