Guentzel clinched the victory with an empty-net goal with 1:19 remaining.
“It’s huge,” Guentzel said. “I think we wanted to win this game. We’re kind of thought of as the villain here. For us to come in here and get these two wins, I think that was big for us.”
The lone negative for the U.S. was Matthew Tkachuk did not play the final 12:36 because of a lower-body injury. Tkachuk downplayed the injury, though, saying he had, “no concern at all,” and with a spot in the final already locked up, the U.S. has the luxury of being able to sit him out Monday, if it chooses, so he has more time to recover.
With or without Matthew Tkachuk, though, the U.S. doesn’t want to take its foot off the gas Monday.
“We came here to try to win the championship,” coach Mike Sullivan said. “We feel like we’ve got a good team. We believe in this group. We think we’ve got a terrific hockey team. Having said that, so does Canada, and Sweden and Finland. So, as we’ve said to our players all along, nothing’s inevitable in this game.
“The greatest thing about our sport is you’ve got to earn it every night and that’s what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to earn it every single day.”
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