Para sport notebook : Canada pleased with silver at inaugural women’s Para ice hockey world championships

DOLNY KUBIN, Slovakia – The final score may have been 7-1, but Canada feels the gap is much smaller to its American rivals following Sunday’s gold medal game loss at the inaugural women’s Para hockey world championships.

In the championship match the U.S., defeated the Canadians to become the first world champs in the sport. Canada takes the silver and Norway won the bronze. Great Britain was fourth, Team World fifth and Australia sixth.

The Canadians went 2-0 in the preliminary round, then defeated Norway 7-0, in the semifinal on Saturday.

Canada’s goal in the final was scored by Alanna Mah of Edmonton in the third period with the score 5-0.

“I think we played a pretty good game,’’  Canadian star forward Raphaelle Tousignant of Terrebonne, Que., told Sportcom. ‘’We’re a team that’s growing, and in my opinion, the score doesn’t really reflect how the game went.’’

More comments from Canadian players HERE

Early in the first with the Americans up 1-0, Tousignant nearly equalized during a 4-on-4 late in the period, but her close-range effort was denied by USA goaltender Gabby Graves-Wake.

‘’We had a lot of chances to score, but we weren’t always able to finish. It’s hard to find the positives right now, but I know that in the long run, we’ll build on this for the future.’’

Canada’s head coach Tara Chisholm agreed that the score didn’t make justice to her team’s efforts.

“I hope the fans back home watched the game,’’ she told paralympic.org.  ‘’The score didn’t tell the tale of how the team played, especially in the third period. USA is obviously really good, but our team stayed with them for the majority of the game and, in the future, as we grow together, it will be a different story.”

Tousignant finished fourth in tournament scoring with four goals and five assists for nine points while Mah was fifth with eight.

Alyssa White of Winnipeg was third in goals scored with six while Aubree Clements of Bowmanville, Ont., notched six assists for second overall.

Clements also was best in the face-off circle at 73.61 percent (53 of 72 won) and Christina Picton of Fonthill, Ont., was third in scoring amongst defencemen.

Hayward takes bronze in road race at Para cycling world championships

After his gold medal in Thursday’s time trial, Alexandre Hayward of Quispamsis, N.B., added the bronze in the men’s C3 (standard bike) 61.6 kilometre road race on the weekend in Ronse, Belgium.

It was a tight race. Finlay Graham of Great Britain took gold in a photo finish clocking one hour and 31:51 minutes.  Thomas Peyroton Dartet of France with the same time was awarded the silver and Hayward was just two seconds back for the bronze.

Michael Sametz of Calgary was eighth, 17 seconds behind the winner.

Jessica Law of Vancouver was sixth in the women’s C5 77 kilometre race and Kara Douville of Calgary placed eighth in the women’s H4 (handcycle) over 46.2 kilometres.