BOURQUE’S FIVE-GOAL EXPLOSION LEADS USA PAST NORWAY

By Dhiren Mahiban

The Americans entered this tournament as one of the heavy favourites to emerge with the gold medal, and on Day One, they didn’t disappoint. Chris Bourque singlehandedly led his team to an 11-2 victory over the Norwegians, scoring a natural hat trick in the second period and then adding two more in the third for a total of five on the night.

Bourque, the son of Hall-of-Famer Ray Bourque, registered his first tally at 1:23 of the second when he grabbed a rebound off a Phil Kessel shot. Then at 7:23 Bourque put what looked like a harmless shot on goal that beat Norway’s starting netminder, Ruben Smith. The Boston native completed the hat trick trick at 11:11 of the second when he put in a cross-ice feed from defenseman Jack Johnson. The goal came on the power play and gave the USA a 7-1 lead at the time.

Bourque scored for a fourth time in the third period to make it 10-2 when he backhanded home a feed from Phil Kessel at 11:38 of the final stanza. He capped off his big night with a shorthanded marker less than two minutes later.

“We got better tonight,” said Bourque. “That’s what we were looking to do. They were a good team tonight and they hung in there.”

Bourque’s five goals equaled current Vancouver Canucks captain Markus Naslund’s mark of five goals for Sweden in a 20-1 rout of Japan during the 1993 tournament.

The second frame also saw the twin tower rearguards of Jack Johnson and Erik Johnson come to life. Not only were the two active on the score sheet, they were also actively stapling the Norwegians to the Coliseum glass. The Americans went to the dressing room with a commanding 8-1 lead, having outshot their opponents 24-6 through two.

The line of Bourque, Kessel, and Kevin Porter, which entered the game as the USA’s top line, combined for a total of 14 points in the US victory. Kessel had five assists and Porter racked up a goal and three helpers.

The opening frame was a penalty-filled affair, with the teams combining for 13 penalties. However, it was the US that came out on top, connecting on two of their seven opportunities. The Americans would finish the night 5-for-18 on the power play while the Norwegians went 2-for-13 in a battle of special teams.

Norway finally got on the scoresheet at the nine-minute mark of the second period when Dennis Sveum stepped out of the penalty box and came in all alone from the center line. The defenceman put a nifty little deke on Schneider before depositing it between his legs.

In an attempt to re-fuel his squad, Norwegian Head Coach Petter Thoresen replaced his starting goaltender with Lars Haugen at 10:13 of the second. However, even Haugen couldn’t ward off Chris Bourque, who scored three of his five goals on Haugen in the last period and a half.

“They were strong on rebounds, and they scored a couple of easy goals on rebounds that I would like to have back,” said starting goalie Ruben Smith. “They were very good at power plays and special teams.”

After some nifty stickwork by Joakim Jensen, Mathias Olimb put the puck past Schneider to make it 9-2, but that’s as close as the Norwegians would come.

“One of the things I’m pleased with is oftentimes teams have a tendency to overlook [other weaker] teams,” said USA Head Coach Walt Kyle. “The thing that I’m happy with is the leadership within the team that allowed our guys to hold [the Norwegians].”

“They’re a classy opponent. However, things didn’t go well for them tonight.”

As the game wore on, the dominance of the American squad began to show through, as the USA stepped up its physical play and the score became lopsided. The announced crowd of 12, 232 that took in the game spent most of the night cheering for the underdog Norwegian squad.

“We know that we’re back in the A Group after 14 years and we have to use this game to prepare for tomorrow to beat Switzerland,” said Thoresen. “We have to win two games to stay in the A Pool. We want to deliver better games, but we didn’t have the capacity on this level.”

The Norwegians will now prepare to take on the Swiss tomorrow night at 19:00 at the Pacific Coliseum. The Americans, on the other hand, won’t see action again until Wednesday evening when they tackle Finland at 20:00.

PREVIEW: NORWAY - USA

By John Kurucz

Norway: It’s been 15 years since Norway has taken part in the IIHF World Junior Championship, and this year’s squad is looking to build upon the successful 2005 qualifying run that got them here. The Norwegians landed a spot in this year’s tournament on the heels of a perfect 5-0 finish in qualifying play at last year’s IIHF World U20 Championship Division I competition. Norway’s last World Junior squad, which played in the 1991 tournament in Saskatoon, finished off with a record of 0-7. After suffering two losses in this year’s pre-tournament exhibition play, Team Norway faces the unenviable task of opening up Round Robin play against the powerhouse USA squad. The two teams faced off in an exhibition contest Dec. 22, one that saw the Americans win handily 5-1. The Norwegians fared a little better versus Team Sweden the next day, but lost the contest 2-1. With goalie Ruben Smith starting in net, the Norwegians will look to forwards Mathis Olimb, Kristian Forsberg and Mathias Trygg as the catalysts of their offensive attack.

USA: Team USA is looking to redeem itself from a disappointing fourth-place finish at last year’s competition and get back to the winning ways of 2004’s gold medal squad. This year, the USA has been pegged as one of the tournament favourites--but don’t tell that to Head Coach Walt Kyle. Both the American bench boss and his players have downplayed the team’s favoured status. But with a wealth of highly-skilled forwards and an imposing defence corps, Team USA should provide the Norwegians with all they can handle. Forwards Phil Kessel, Robbie Schremp and Bobby Ryan will exhaust the Norwegian back end, while defensive stalwarts Jack Johnson and Brian Lee will look to shut down any attack the Norwegians can muster. Jeff Frazee is expected to get the start in goal. Coming off two exhibition victories, with 5-1 and 3-2 wins over Norway and Sweden respectively, the Americans should dominate this contest from start to finish.