February 22, 2010 E-MAIL PRINT

Drury: We're still underdogs

by Kirk Luedeke/

Chris Drury (Trumbull, Conn.) celebrates his goal in a 5-3 win over Canada on Sunday. (photo: Getty)

Chris Drury (Trumbull, Conn.) celebrates his goal in a 5-3 win over Canada on Sunday. (photo: Getty)

Chris Drury (Trumbull, Conn.) and his fellow Team USA hockey players have gone 3-0 in the preliminary round of the Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver to lock up the top seed entering the medal round, and have also silenced some of the doubters who questioned the team’s youth and experience.

 “We’re still the underdogs with our lack of experience,” Drury said during a media conference call the day after Team USA defeated Canada, adding that with the format moving to single elimination, the team’s youth will be tested in the coming days.

Although Drury’s worthiness to be on the roster was questioned in some media circles when the team’s selections were announced Jan. 1, he refused to take the bait when asked if the snubs provided extra motivation for him.

 “Not at all,” Drury said. “Motivation for me is looking across the ice and seeing a team with a different jersey. If I need motivation from what people say or write, then I probably shouldn’t be here.”

Against Canada, Drury scored a late second period goal to break a 2-2 deadlock. The Americans never trailed after that, although Sidney Crosby’s power-play goal, which pulled Canada to within a 4-3 margin, erased the tally as a game-winner. However, the 33-year-old New York Rangers captain’s strike further cemented his big-game reputation, even if he himself wasn’t willing to call it another in a long line of key tallies in his career.

 “I never really look at it that way,” he said, when asked how important he felt the goal was in the context of his successful career. “We wanted to get the No. 1 seed. It wasn’t a gold medal game — there’s a lot of hockey to be played.”

The U.S. will play the winner of the first-round game between Switzerland and Belarus in its quarterfinal on Wednesday (3 p.m. EST).

What Drury felt has been more important to Team USA’s performance thus far, and as every game takes on “must-win” status, is the solid chemistry he noticed when arriving in Vancouver last week.

 “I wasn’t really surprised upon getting here and seeing how close some of the guys actually were,” he said, replying to a query about whether he saw Team USA securing the top seed in the round-robin. “It just seemed to me that right off the bat, these guys had a lot of chemistry built in.”

Some of that chemistry is borne from the percentage of under-30 players who grew up together in the U.S. National Team Development Program in Ann Arbor, Mich. Zach Parise, Ryan Suter, Dustin Brown and Ryan Kesler all formed the nucleus of the United States’ first-ever gold medal World Junior Championship (Under-20) team in 2004.

“It’s very impressive to me not only how talented but how mature our young players are,” Drury added, discussing the U.S. NTDP and its contributions to America’s pro hockey talent pool in the last decade since its inception.

Drury’s age and experience of having participated in two previous Olympic competitions means that he understands that all of the goodwill built up in three preliminary-round wins could be undone by one poor outing from here on out. The Americans set themselves up for a strong run, but nothing can be taken for granted.

 “I’m kind of rated based on wins and losses,” he said, when asked to rate his performance so far. “We got off to a good start in the preliminary round and I’m glad I’m able to help out with whatever (GM Brian Burke) or Coach (Ron) Wilson wants me to do.”

His team will need more of the same from him this week in order for the U.S. to win its first gold medal in three decades.

Kirk Luedeke can be reached at feedback@hockeyjournal.com.

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