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Galchenyuk and Oshie Make Debut in Loss to Slovakia

05/14/2013, 10:45am EDT
By Brian Pinelli - Special to USAHockey.com

HELSINKI, Finland - The United States allowed two goals in the opening four minutes of play and lost an opportunity to secure the top seed in Group H for Thursday’s quarterfinals, falling 4-1 to Slovakia.

U.S. Head Coach Joe Sacco inserted newcomers Alex Galchenyuk and T.J. Oshie – both of whom arrived to Helsinki over the past 48 hours following their NHL teams exiting the playoffs – onto a line with Tim Stapleton, seeking to add offensive depth to the roster.

In the second half of the first period, Oshie set up Stapleton nicely on a few occasions, but the 5-foot-9 center couldn’t beat Slovakian goalie Rastislav Stana from the slot or from on the doorstep.

“They give us a more balanced attack up front I think…I put Stapleton in the middle of those two players and I thought it was one of our better lines tonight as far as generating five-on-five chances,” Sacco said about the move.

“It was a quick turn-around, but I thought I felt good, definitely good enough to create chances out there, but it just didn’t happen,” said Oshie, who arrived on Monday night. “Our line did have a little bit of chemistry and hopefully we can build on it.”


T.J. Oshie

Galchenyuk, 19, arrived one day sooner than Oshie after his Montreal Canadians failed to advance in the playoffs, and skated in Sunday’s warm-up against Germany, but received his first minutes of action on Tuesday.

“It’s tough…you try to contribute because we both know we were brought in to help offensively,” said Galchenyuk, who was a member of the U.S. team that won gold at the recent IIHF World Junior Championship in Ufa, Russia. “It is a positive that we created chances, but it doesn’t matter if you don’t score. We have to re-charge and re-focus for the next game.

Stapleton, Oshie and Galchenyuk combined for eight of Team USA’s 21 shots on goal, but the lone score came from Danny Kristo in the final minute of the second period. Kristo’s goal cut the lead to 3-1, but the U.S. was unable to score in the third period and Slovakia sealed the victory on an empty net goal with 1:24 remaining in the game.

“I think Galchenyuk played a real strong two-way game and Oshie just got here last night so I’m sure he’ll get better as we go on,” Sacco said about the new additions. “Hopefully, they’ll continue to gell and play better together.”

The U.S. was outshot by Slovakia 26-21, a team that played desperate needing a victory to remain alive in their pursuit of a spot in the quarterfinals.

Coach Sacco alluded to the team’s difficult start and an early mistake by goaltender Ben Bishop as being contributing factors in the loss.

“The first two goals were unfortunate for our team – the mishandling of the puck on the first one,” Sacco said referring to Bishop’s mishap 15 seconds into the game. “And the second one we’d like to have back, so we got down behind the eight ball early and it’s tough to play catch up hockey.”

“We were hopeful and excited about the opportunity to finish first, it would have been a nice feather in the cap for our players,” Sacco said. “We weren’t able to do that so we’ll turn the page and get ready for our next opponent.”

With the loss, the U.S. will meet either Russia or tournament host Finland in Thursday’s quarterfinals.

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