U.S. Women Win Warmup

If the U.S. women needed a confidence builder before Tuesday night’s gold-medal hockey game with Canada, they got it.

Down 4-1 six minutes into the third period Saturday, the United States rallied to tie the Canadians, then kept right on going for a 7-4 victory in the final game of the preliminary round.

Since the game was nothing more than a warmup for the real thing, it didn’t really prove anything. Still, the United States has finished second to Canada in all four women’s world championships since 1990, and Canada won their pre-Olympic exhibition series, 7-6. So coming back from a three-goal disadvantage against the best in the business ought to count for something.

“For a game that didn’t mean anything, it was played with the utmost intensity and passion,” U.S. Coach Ben Smith said.

And the way the U.S. women went about it should count for something else.

Canada started the third period on a power play and quickly broke a 1-1 tie when Lori Dupuis scored on a rebound, her second goal. Jayna Hefford and Therese Brisson added power-play goals in the next five minutes and, suddenly, the U.S. was on the wrong end of a 4-1 score.

That could have been pack-it-in time.

Instead, Laurie Baker launched the comeback less than two minutes later, scoring on a rebound. And when the U.S. gained a two-player advantage, Cammi Granato poked in another rebound. Then Jennifer Schmidgall tied the score, 4-4, with still another power-play rebound and suddenly the U.S. was rolling.

Tricia Dunn scored the tie-breaker only 13 seconds later, at 12:48 of the third period, forward Lisa Brown-Miller scored with three minutes left and Baker shot into an empty net with 1:02 left as Canada pulled its goalie, hoping to salvage at least a tie from what had been such a promising start.

Canadians Fiona Smith and Karen Nystrom sat out the game with injuries, according to Coach Shannon Miller, but she wouldn’t say what they were.

And in what evolved into a physical game, Smith said the Canadians might have been underpowered.

“There were so many special-team situations that some of the players began to tire,” he said. “I’m sure that the number of players, a couple of extra bodies, will have an effect next week [in the title game].”

Referee Manuela Groeger assessed 48 minutes in penalties. Vicki Movsessian of the U.S. got a double-minor for high-sticking--she caught Danielle Goyette across the neck--and teammate Angela Ruggiero got a 10-minute misconduct for checking from behind.