USA Beats Canada: I Guess "Tarzan Boy" Works After All

In my previous post I made light of one of the choices on the pregame musical playlist of Patrick Kane from the USA Olympic Men's Hockey team (and the Chicago Blackhawks). "'Tarzan Boy'? Really?" I wrote. I find it hard to be inspired with lyrics like these:

Jungle life/We're living in the open
All alone/Like Tarzan Boy
Hide and seek/We play along while rushing
Cross the forest
Monkey business/On a sunny afternoon

But hey, that's just me. It seems to work for Patrick Kane. And the United States team came away tonight with a surprising 5-3 victory over Team Canada -- in Vancouver, making it essentially a road game for the USA -- in the final preliminary game of the Olympic hockey tournament. The USA hadn't beaten Canada in a game at the Olympics since 1960. That year, the USA went on to win a surprise gold medal at Squaw Valley. Twenty years later came the "Miracle on Ice" win over the powerful Soviet Union at Lake Placid that led to another gold.

It's now 50 and 30 years later, respectively, and although these Olympics aren't in the United States they are on the same continent, so perhaps Team USA is due, if not destined to win gold. The win over Canada certainly makes their path easier -- they get an extra day of rest before the quartefinals, while Canada will have to play Germany to get into the quarters, and then are likely to play Russia in the quarterfinal game. Thus, team USA will only have to face one of these two in order to win gold.

The Canadians outshot the Americans* 45-22 but USA goalie Ryan Miller was superb while Canada goalie Martin Brodeur was, well, not. Miller and the USA held on under relentless pressure after a Sidney Crosby goal got Canada within 4-3 with 3:09 left, until Ryan Kesler (at left) scored an empty-net goal with 45 seconds to go. (Ironically, Kesler plays for the Vancouver Canucks so he was a visiting player on his home ice, and Canucks fans have to be conflicted.) Watching those minutes between the Crosby and Kesler goals, I half-expected Canada to tie the game. It was that intense.

*Yes, I'm fully aware that Canadians are technically also Americans, since we're all part of North America.

The thing is, while there's still a talent gap between Canada and the USA, it's not as wide as it used to be. So this isn't like those 1980 and 1960 teams (especially with the NHL players involved). What team USA did tonight was limit their mistakes and capitalize on those made by Canada. Do that, and get quality goaltending as Miller provided, and any game is winnable. So tonight's win is a surprise, but not too much of one.

So team USA wins and I've made my peace with "Tarzan Boy" as inspiration, but I have no idea what the deal is with this picture of Kesler: