USA played Sweden this morning from Ufa, Russia in the gold medal game of the IIHF World Junior Championships, and took home the gold medal. This is only the third time that USA have won the medal in the tournament.

Those who were up at 8 am this morning watching saw how amazing the game was. Those who weren’t, shame on you, but here’s the game recap.

The first period was scoreless, and both Gibson and Lundstrom were on their game.

Sweden got the puck going early with the first goal in the second period. Rocco Grimaldi tied the game for USA in the second and then scored again in the period to give USA the 2-1 lead.

USA maintained their lead throughout the final period. Again Gibson was on his game with making stops, proving that he’ll be a goalie to look out for in the future. When Lundstrom was pulled at the end of the period, Pennsylvania native, Trochek scored the empty netter to secure their gold medal win.

Team USA completely wrecked Canada, just proving that the team who learns the most in the competition goes the farthest. They learned from their mistakes from the game which they lost to the Canadians and brought their A game to the ice.

Canada now goes to the Gold Medal round where they will take on Team Sweden. This will be the first time that the Swedes and the Americans will match up. Team Canada will go to the bronze medal round to play against host Russia.

USA plays tomorrow at 8 am EST, so remember to set your alarm clocks. USA! USA! USA!

Courtesy of sportslogos.net

Preliminary rounds for the IIHF under 20 world juniors began and Team USA has already dropped to the third spot in the Group B rankings.  They are 2-1-0 with 3 points.

On Thursday Team USA annihilated Team Germany in an 8-0 shutout loss and then went on to play team Russia on Friday morning.

Team Russia beat the Americans 2-1. Russia is the top seed for Group B 3-2-1 with 18 points.

Despite the loss, Flyers 3rd round draft pick Shayne Gostisbehere is making waves and impressing the Flyers organization. Gostisbehere scored a power play goal in the game against germany and was active with the puck in Friday’s game.  He is definitely a guy to be looking at for a future.

Gostisbehere currently attends Union College in Schenectady, NY. He has plans to continue with his education and graduate before making his NHL debut.

Team USA will take on Team Canada early Sunday morning at 4:30 a.m. Canada is second in Group B just below Russia, with 2-2-0 and 6 points. Since hockey is “Canada’s game” the game against them will be just as tough if not tougher than the game against the Russians.