USA Women Advance To Fifth Place Match With 8-4 Defeat Of Canada At FINA World Championships
7/26/2011 12:00:00 AM
Shanghai, China - July 27 - The USA Women's National Team will play for fifth place at the FINA World Championships after defeating Canada 8-4 in the 5th-8th place semifinals. The team now moves on to meet either Australia or the Netherlands in a match on Friday at 10:55am local time - 7:55pm pst (Thurs). Team USA tied the Netherlands 7-7 to open the tournament on July 17. In the win over Canada the resilient United States was led by Heather Petri (Orinda, CA/California/NYAC) who tallied two goals and goalie Betsey Armstrong (Ann Arbor, MI/Michigan/NYAC) who stopped 12 shots across four quarters.
It was a slow start as the the North American neighbors got settled in over the first four minutes. It was was then at the 4:05 mark that Brenda Villa (Commerce, CA/Stanford/Olympic Club) skipped home a shot for a 1-0 lead. Canada answered less than a minute later with a skip shot goal of their own that went bar down and in for a 1-1 match. With 2:49 left in the period Maggie Steffens (Danville, CA/Monte Vista HS/Diablo) scored a fancy shot gathering the ball in front of the net on a rebounded shot and tipping it from her left hand to her right and then past the goalie for a 2-1 lead. Armstrong was whistled for a penalty as the period wound to a close and Canada scored on the five meter shot to again tie the match, this time at 2-2, headed to the second.
The second quarter opened and closed with a United States goal and in between there was nothing but defense. Less than a minute into the period Kami Craig (Santa Barbara, CA/USC/Santa Barbara WPF) got free inside and took a great pass from Villa on a power play to find the cage for a 3-2 lead. Then with a little over a minute remaining in the quarter Lauren Wenger (Long Beach, CA/USC/NYAC) tossed one in from distance on a power play to put the United States up 4-2 at halftime. Most of the third quarter belonged to Petri and she struck early with a cross cage skip shot for a 5-2 lead some ninety seconds into the quarter and then came back at the 5:22 mark with a skip shot from downtown for a 6-2 score, the largest lead of the game for the USA at that point. With 1:11 left in the quarter Canada got one back scoring on a power play goal to cut the deficit down to 6-3 with play moving to the fourth quarter.
In the last quarter the United Stats kept attacking, after Maggie Steffens drew a power play it was Annika Dries (Laguna Beach, CA/Stanford/SET) beating the goalie from four meters for a 7-3 lead. Canada scored a power play goal on their next possession to move the score to 7-4 but Courtney Mathewson (Anaheim Hills, CA/UCLA/NYAC) closed out the scoring for the United Stats with an outside shot to build the lead to 8-4 with 5:27 remaining. The United States defense held down the fort the rest of the day and they came away victorious. Team USA shot 3/5 on power plays while not attempting a penalty shot and Canada went 3/8 on power plays and 1/1 on penalty shots.
Scoring - Scoresheet
USA 8 (2, 2, 2, 2) H. Petri 2, M. Steffens 1, K. Craig 1, L. Wenger 1, A. Dries 1, C. Mathewson 1, B. Villa 1
CAN 4 (2, 0, 1, 1)
Saves - USA - B. Armstrong - 11
6x5 - USA - 3/5 - CAN - 3/8
Penalties - USA - 0/0 - CAN 1/1
Flash Quotes
"I was very happy with our effort and our ability to come back. I think that shows alot of character and alot of toughness and that's what this team is all about. As disappointing as it was two days ago we know that we are going to learn from it and bounce back and it showed we had one bad quarter here." Adam Krikorian, USA Head Coach
"I don't know if anything will really kind of take the sting away from that loss. For us it's important we feel the sting, it's not something we've felt and it's not something I've felt in a long time. It makes you appreciate just how difficult it is to win games at this level. I've been saying this all along, this women's water polo tournament, the parity in women's water polo is incredible. I think we have a little bit more respect for that now." - Adam Krikorian, USA Head Coach
Women's National Team