An impressive run for the USA hockey team fell short at this year’s Winter Olympics, as the Americans lost to Canada 3-2 in overtime in Sunday’s gold medal round. Sidney Crosby beat Ryan Miller 7:40 into overtime to allow the Canadians to become the first host nation in 30 years to win the gold medal in men’s hockey.

The win certainly didn’t come easy for Canada, however, which led 2-1 for most of the game.

After pulling goalie Ryan Miller late in the third period, Jamie Langenbrunner redirected a Patrick Kane wrister off Roberto Luongo’s body and Zach Parise gathered up the rebound and snuck it past Luongo to tie the game with just 24.4 seconds remaining. But after seizing the momentum thanks to the thrilling goal, USA couldn’t get the job done in overtime and the heavily favored Canadians (who were 1/2 to win the tournament at the start of the Winter Games) seized the gold.

Even though they lost, USA’s push for the gold was arguably the most exciting part of the Winter Olympics. It would have been nice to see them go undefeated and complete the underdog story, but there’s no shame in beating Canada once and nearly knocking them off on their home ice in the finals. Gold would have been fine, but there’s a lot of pride for USA in taking home the silver.

The hockey teams for USA and Canada both won in the semi-finals round last night in Vancouver and will now play for the Winter Olympic Gold medal on Sunday.

From the Washington Times:

The United States is the only unbeaten team in this year’s tournament, having outscored their opponents 22-6 in five straight wins — the longest an American team has gone without a loss or tie in an Olympic tournament since the 1960 squad.

Few people expected this kind of success out of this particular squad, as unlike some of the other teams in the tournament, the U.S. has only three players with previous Olympic experience, and had to rely on its young talent like Chicago Blackhawks star Patrick Kane.

But standing in the way of perfection and the gold medal is the host Canadians, who were heavy favorites coming into the tournament and feature three Hart Trophy winners on their talent-laden roster.

The theme of this year’s gold-medal game is also one of revenge, as the two neighbors have supplanted Russia as each other’s top rival in the past decade. The U.S. and Canada now have met in two of the last three Olympic finals — not to mention splitting the last seven World Junior Championship titles.

Personally, the hockey tournament has been the most exciting part of this year’s Olympics and I love USA’s story. While it wouldn’t quite be another miracle on ice, watching Team USA spoil Canada’s run at a gold medal would highly entertaining.