Team USA Takes The Bronze in IIHF World Junior Championship

"It's a mans game," said USA forward Chris Kreider. And finally, Team USA is once again playing like men. They broke the trend of sloppy hockey against Sweden, playing for the bronze medal in the 2011 IIHF World Junior Championship.

The United States started off strong in a scoreless first period. In Mondays game against Canada, the team looked exhausted at the end of every shift, and by the end of the first period they looked completely out of gas. This was not the case in today's game. Team USA looked refreshed from their day off, intent on forgetting Monday's embarrassment against the Canadians. From the drop of the puck USA finished shifts with energy, and controlled the puck much better than they had in their previous game. Several opportunities were stolen from the United States as Sweden's goalie did everything but stand on his head to make saves.

The second period was played much the same as the first, and at about the 10 minute mark Sweden scored on USA goalie Jack Campbell. The Swedes played an aggressive game, looking more like a North American team, than a typical European team. (An interesting side-note mentioned during the broadcast: almost every player on Sweden's WJC roster is an NHL draft pick. Impressive numbers Team Sweden.) Team USA also put up a goal, scored by Chris Kreider. Though they maintained pace and pressure, they did not manage to keep the shots up.

Correcting their mistakes, Team USA got an early goal and took the lead for the first time in the game. With the United States in control, an aggressive power play pushed the pace of the game, but did not result in a third goal. A fault of the offense throughout the game, and the tournament was the failure to get the puck in the air on their shots. At 8:20 Nick Bjugstad made it 3-1 USA. Sweden was not rattled, and responded with a goal 2 minutes later, making it 3-2. A two on one opportunity created a fourth goal for USA, second of the night from Kreider.

A schizophrenic two final minutes led to Team USA taking the bronze. This is a huge opportunity for USA Hockey. Following last year's Gold Medal victory, this is the second consecutive year that the USA has medaled, a first for the program. As NHLers in international competition (aka the Olympics) is a hot-topic, hopefully this will not be the last international competition that these young men (who are mostly comprised of NHL draft picks) are eligible to compete in.