Rough Draft News Story

With the action in Vancouver over and the dedicated fans from all of their countries fly home everyone in America is still talking about Team USA men’s hockey. Team USA is coming off one of their most successful Olympic tournament in a while. With stars like Ryan Miller the Olympic tournament MVP and Zach Parise a Minnesota native from Prior Lake, USA went all the way to the gold medal game only to lose seven minutes into overtime to a goal made by Canadian super star Sidney Crosby. At the beginning at the tournament Team USA did not have high expectations from their critics. Four years before Vancouver the USA was knocked out early and many thought it will happen again. USA went into their first Preliminary Round game against a talented Switzerland team. With outstanding goal tending by Ryan Miller and physical game play USA got its first of many win of the Olympics with a score of 3-1. Many people were still not sure how well USA would play because they only won by two goals and it was the first game, But Team USA proved that they were serious about a medal when they played Norway. With nonstop offensive and a great goal tender in net doing his part to keep his team ahead the Americans won convincingly 6-1. With two games behind the American team the biggest game of the tournament now faced them. Their rivals to the north and heavily favored gold medal Team Canada was now their next challenge. With the odds not in their favor Team USA took the opening faceoff against the Canadians. Team Canada was relentless on offense. They took countless shots at the American goalie Ryan Miller and he turned away all but three of them. Team USA was not afraid to hit the ice and block shots and they blocked a total of 28 shots. With once in a while odd man rushes the United States put four pucks behind the Canadian goalie Martin Broudeur. With only minutes left in the game and USA leading 4-3 Canada pulls their goalie to get an extra attacker. Zach Parise gives a beautiful pass to Ryan Kesler scored a empty net goal to make it 5-3. When asked how did you feel when USA beat Canada one die hard American fan said “I was extremely happy because Canada was the favorite”. While all the Canadian fans left Canada Hockey Place in complete shock and hopes of a gold medal now seemed impossible. USA beating Canada got a first round bye and the first seed they were now number one. The same USA fan said “[the best moment for USA was] beating Canada”. Shocking the world the Americans prepared for the Quarter final game against Switzerland. Many thought that Team USA would underestimate Switzerland because they already beat them once and in a way the American team did. No one expected this game to be a battle between the goalies Ryan Miller (Team USA) and Jonas Hiller (Team Switzerland). With a hard fought battle trying to find a way to beat Hiller and Ryan Miller having probably his best game of the tournament so far USA went on to the Semi Finals by a score of 2-0. The Americans now faced Team Finland in a winner goes for gold game. The United States once again proved their dominance by scoring six goals in the first 13 minutes of the game. Goal tender for Finland Miikka Kiprusoff was pulled from the game and Minnesota Wild’s goalie Niklas Backstrom was put in. Ryan Miller for Team USA was pulled in the third period so he will be fresh for the gold medal game. He was replaced by Boston Bruins goalie Tim Thomas. The Americans went on to the Finals by a score of 6-1. Only goal for Finland was scored on Thomas so Miller had another shut out. Now America must face t-heir biggest challenge of the tournament playing Canada for the gold. Many thought that USA would not be even mentioned for the gold before the Olympics and now they are playing the host team. The Canadians decided to put Roberto Luongo in net since he plays for Vancouver in the NHL and he knows how far the puck bounces off the boards the best. Canada started the game as the dominate team. They scored twice to make the score 2-0. USA rallied to score one goal so it was 2-1. Then both teams scored again late in the game to make it 3-2. Canada thinking that they had the gold medal one, USA pulled Ryan Miller to gain the extra attacker. With 24 seconds left in the game and Canadian fans cheering thinking that they have it won Minnesota’s own Zach Parise put in the game tying goal. As the Canadian fans went quite and the USA bench erupted they have sent the game into overtime. Seven minutes into overtime Canada came out shooting the puck and testing Ryan Millers skills. The Canadian super star and worldwide known Sidney Crosby shots the puck and watches it has it goes five hole on Ryan Miller and just won Canada the gold. The United States of America went into the 2010 Vancouver Olympics not expecting any medal for men’s hockey but proved to the world that a miracle on ice doesn’t mean you have to win the gold.