Canadian women’s hockey coach Laura Schuler called her team’s performance an “embarrassment to our country” after a 5-2 loss to the U.S. on Sunday, according to reports.
The defeat in Quebec City marked the first of at least seven matchups between the bitter rivals leading up to the PyeongChang Olympics in February.
They’ll play again in Boston on Wednesday.
“We played awful,” the 46-year-old Schuler said, according to SB Nation. “It was just a horrible performance from all of our players, and we’ll address it tonight and make sure we’re better and ready in Boston.”
Canada outshot the U.S. 25-24 but went 0-for-2 on the power play, while the U.S. converted on two of its three chances.
Canada did not start its longtime No. 1 goalie, Shannon Szabados. The U.S. also rested its top two goalies from this Olympic cycle, during which it has beaten Canada in all three world championship finals.
“It wasn’t the game that we could play,” Schuler said, according to SB Nation. “Obviously we’ve played significantly better against them. We have been playing better, and that was not a good example of how we can play. It was an embarrassment to our country, and we need to be better as we go forward.
“We were bad from the net all the way out. All of us. We weren’t good.”
Schuler, a forward on Canada’s silver-medal team at the 1998 Olympics, has been head coach since 2015.
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