Olympic Games: Women’s Medal Matches Previews
As expected the Women's final will see Sochi Gold medal holders Canada face arch enemies and Sochi Silver medal holders USA; in the bronze match two teams will face each other who did not medal at Sochi in the winner takes all Bronze match between Finland and Russia.
The Gold-Silver Match
Finally the moment we all have waited for, the final of the Women’s
hockey tournament. As expected, Canada take on the United States in a re-run of
every Olympic and World Championship final of the sport’s history where Canada
have won all but one Olympics, the USA have four World Cup wins in row to their
name. The Group A match finished 2-1 to the Canadians a week ago. The question
is will the USA take revenge or will it be business as usual with Canada taking
gold?
Canada have taken the unusual tactic of taking all their players out of
their regular teams and playing them together the whole season in the men’s
hockey division, the Alberta
Midgets Hockey League. Top scorer there have been centre Jennifer Wakefield and
forward Meghan Agosta
where they both have 11 points in c 15 games. After the Olympics Wakefield will
return to Sweden where she has played almost all of her professional career,
this time with Luleå HF
in their push for the SDHL
Championship. However it is Mélodie
Daoust, the Montreal
Canadieenes player that leads the team in scoring at the
Olympics with 6 points including 3 goals in only four games.
The
Americans have also opted for taking their players out of their regular season
to train together in a marked contrast to the men’s game where the league has
more power than the national teams. Top scorer for the team at the Olympics has
been Dani Camarensi in
her first Games with 5 points and 3 goals in four matches. She normally plays
for the University of
Minnesota in the top US women’s league, the NCAA. The 22 year old has
an incredible 1.41 PPG in 143 matches in the league, twice coming fourth in the
Total Points competition in 2015-6 and 2016-7. Their second placed top scorer
is Joycelene
Lamoureux-Davidson who also has outstanding statistics from her
time at University of North
Dakota in the NCAA with 1.91 PPG in 149 matches. She will desperately want to turn her Silver from Sochi
to Gold in Korea. It remains to be seen if this American fire-power will be
enough to take home their first Gold since the sport’s inaugural Games of 1998. Or will Wakefield and company continue to write Olympic History
with red and white with a maple leaf motif?
The Bronze
medal match
Finland will play against OA Russia as it was in the Group A match where
the Finns won convincingly 5-1. Of course, the OA Russia team is not featuring
6 specifically named players banned for life by the IOC who featured in Sochi
team than finished sixth. But even without them the women’s team will finish
higher this time round. One player who scored in that Group A match and played
in Sochi then aged only 16 is Anna
Shokhina. The Tornado
Dmitrov forward is the team’s top scorer who plays with the
year of her birth on her shirt, #97. She has five points in just four games
including three goals so far and lies in second place for Total Points in
Women’s Russia hockey league this season.
The Russian was only just born as Finnish veteran and highest scorer, Riikka Välilä, was
collecting a bronze medal at the Japan Winter Olympics. The 44 year old also
scored in the teams’ Group A meeting and has the same amount of games and
points as her younger rival, but has four goals and one assist. In her regular
season the Finn lies ninth in the Total Points competition in the Swedish SDHL league with 40 points
in 31 matches. In surely her last Olympics the HV71 captain will be looked to add a final
Bronze to that she already holds from 20 years ago!