USA takes gold at World-U17 Hockey Challenge with win over Canada Red

The United States have won gold at the World U-17 Hockey Challenge for the sixth time and first since 2017 after beating Canada 11-3 on Saturday evening in British Columbia.

Held in British Columbia, it was the first run at the tournament since Russia won gold in 2019.

It was a strong effort from the United States, who scored three times in the third period. James Hagens opened the scoring at 13:45 after taking Cole Eiserman’s pass in close for the 1-0 goal, only for Lucas Van Vilet to score on the very next shift. Eiserman then scored one of his own from a Will Skahan feed, with Hagens getting another point as the secondary assist.

Hagens would make history in the second period, surpassing Colin White (18) as the single-tournament scoring leader with his 19th point in just seven games. At 1:28, Charlie Pardue finished off a play that saw both Eiserman and Hagens record points, continuing their reign as the tournament’s top scorers.

Canada would then go on to score a pair to cut the lead in half – first, Porter Martone scored his sixth of the tournament at 27:14, and then Nathan Villeneuve potted one on the man advantage two minutes later to cut the American lead in half.

There wasn’t much Canada could do to slow the American attack, though. At 33:29, Christian Humphreys set Shane Vansaghi up on the breakaway, beating Gabriel D’Aigle for the 5-2 goal. Vansaghi was injured on the play and went to the changeroom after getting crosschecked by Tarin Smith, resulting in a penalty. USA had a brief 5-on-3, and just after Smith’s penalty ended, Eiserman found Brodie Ziemer for the 6-2 goal. That tied Eiserman with White for the second most points in a single tournament, showing just how dangerous both he and Hagens had been all tournament long.

Martone scored his second of the night just 11 seconds into the third, but USA continued causing damage. After just 1:18, Brendan McMorrow scored to make it 7-3, with Kristian Epperson scoring on the next shift. Hagens then continued his tournament-record attack with another goal at 2:41, marking a four-goal rush in the opening three minutes of the third.

Eiserman then tied history with a pair of goals at 47:39 and 50:39. His 12th goal of the tournament tied Alex Ovechkin for the most ever, making even more history on a special evening in Langley.

Earlier in the day, Finland beat Canada Black 7-1 for bronze, turning the tides after allowing 16 goals in their last two round-robin games.