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U.S. National Sled Hockey Team Beats Canada 3-0 in Preliminary Round of World Para Ice Hockey Championship

By USA Hockey, 05/31/23, 11:30PM EDT

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Team USA will play in the semifinals Saturday at 5:00 p.m. ET

MOOSE JAW, Sask. – Brody Roybal (Northlake, Ill.), Jack Wallace (Franklin Lakes, N.J.),and Travis Dodson (Deming, N.M) all scored and Jen Lee (San Francisco, Calif.) recorded a shutout as the U.S. National Sled Hockey Team defeated Canada 3-0 in its final preliminary round game of the 2023 World Para Ice Hockey Championship at the Moose Jaw Events Centre. 

With the win, the U.S. moves to 3-0-0-0 (W-OTW-OTL-L) on the tournament and 14-2-0-0 (W-OTW-OTL-L) on the season. The U.S. heads into the playoff rounds as the top seed, earning a bye until the semifinal round on Saturday. 

“That’s as solid as an effort that we’ve had for a full 45 minutes” said David Hoff (Bottineau, N.D.), head coach of the U.S. National Sled Hockey Team, “The ability to keep everyone involved and keep that tempo up made us really hard to play against”.

At the 10:03 mark in the first, Canada went to the powerplay but were stifled by Team USA’s penalty kill. With 1:48 remaining in the first, the U.S. went on the man advantage and generated several strong chances, including a two-on-one opportunity for Malik Jones (Aurora, Colo.) and Declan Farmer (Tampa, Fla.), but were unable to score. 

Though scoreless through one, the U.S. held a 10-1 advantage on shots on goal. 

The game remained knotted at zero through the first nine minutes of the second before Brody Roybal (Northlake, Ill.) tallied the game’s first goal, and what would be the game-winner, with 5:11 to go, rifling a shot from the top of the right faceoff circle that deflected off the outstretched glove of the goaltender and in to give the U.S. a 1-0 lead. Jack Wallace (Franklin lakes, N.J.) and Ben Musselman (Amelia, Ohio) picked up assists on the goal and the U.S. maintained the goal advantage for the remainder of the period.

Game Photos

Just over four minutes into the third, the U.S. went to the penalty kill, getting several key stops to hold the 1-0 lead. 

With just over four minutes to go in the game, the U.S. went to the man advantage and at the 11:20 mark Wallace scored his first goal of the tournament with assists from Jones and Josh Misiewicz (La Grange, Ill.). 

Dodson scored an empty net goal for his team-leading fifth tally of the tournament to seal the 3-0 victory. 

NOTES: Brody Roybal was named the U.S. Player of the Game … The U.S. outshot Canada 22-8 … The U.S. was 1-4 on the power play, while Canada was 0-2.

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