{"id":26968,"date":"2005-01-04T15:09:15","date_gmt":"2005-01-04T21:09:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uscho.com\/2005\/01\/04\/medal-denied-as-us-falls-to-czechs-at-wjc\/"},"modified":"2010-08-17T19:56:05","modified_gmt":"2010-08-18T00:56:05","slug":"medal-denied-as-us-falls-to-czechs-at-wjc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp-admin.uscho.com\/2005\/01\/04\/medal-denied-as-us-falls-to-czechs-at-wjc\/","title":{"rendered":"Medal Denied As U.S. Falls To Czechs At WJC"},"content":{"rendered":"
The U.S. dropped the bronze-medal game at the World Junior Championships Tuesday to the Czech Republic, finishing in fourth place in the tournament. The Czechs took the 3-2 win in overtime, foiling two U.S. comeback attempts.<\/p>\n
“It was disappointing not to have a better performance, not only tonight, but along the way,” said U.S. head coach Scott Sandelin. “Sometimes this game comes down to bounces. I thought both teams played well, but in the end, they got the last bounce and break, and that’s why they won.”<\/p>\n
The Czechs got off to an early advantage, converting on a U.S. penalty when Michael Polak lifted a wrister over the shoulder of Michigan’s Al Montoya. But with the Americans skating on the man-advantage, Montoya’s Michigan teammate Kevin Porter evened the tilt, stickhandling around Czech goaltender Marek Schwarz before burying the puck low to the far side.<\/p>\n
Time expired in the opening stanza with the teams tied at one.<\/p>\n
The second period opened with the U.S. on the power play, due to an unsportsmanlike conduct call against Rostislav Olesz. The Czechs killed the penalty and regained the lead at 6:03 when Michael Frolik took a backhanded pass and went low to the stick side, for a 2-1 advantage.<\/p>\n
North Dakota’s Drew Stafford knotted the score with his third power-play goal of the tournament, taking a cross-ice pass from Patrick O’Sullivan and beating Schwarz in the far corner.<\/p>\n
After skating through a scoreless third period, the teams went to overtime. Montoya turned away three Czech shots before Petr Vrana picked up the puck at his own blueline and scored on a breakaway at 2:38 of the extra session.<\/p>\n
Russia and Canada faced off in the gold-medal game at 7:05 p.m. CST.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The U.S. dropped the bronze-medal game at the World Junior Championships Tuesday to the Czech Republic, finishing in fourth place in the tournament. The Czechs took the 3-2 win in overtime, foiling two U.S. comeback attempts. “It was disappointing not to have a better performance, not only tonight, but along the way,” said U.S. head […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":140328,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n