Top 7 trash reactions after USA beat Canada in World Juniors

The United States defeated Canada in a hockey thing on Thursday night, which meant that social media quickly descended into a glass cage of emotion.

Things were said that will be regretted. Things were said that shouldn’t be regretted. Things were … said.

Here are the Top 7 Trash Reactions After USA Beat Canada In World Juniors on Thursday night.

1 – Attacking Auston Matthews For His Patriotism

Auston Matthews, the 19-year-old potential rookie of the year and franchise savior of the Toronto Maple Leafs, had the audacity to tweet three American flag emojis after Team USA defeated Canada in a shootout for U20 IIHF World Juniors gold, their fourth such medal in tournament history.

Matthews, remember, has not only played for this national team but knows many of these players. Also, he’s a hockey patriot living amongst the enemy, and took a moment to celebrate this.

It didn’t go over well.

Now, for all of you hoping and wishing Matthews will leave Canada anytime soon, it’s obviously not going to happen. Young players are basically shackled to their teams for several years, per the CBA.

But let’s all remember this night when Auston goes UFA and leaves for whatever relocated Canadian team has been then-added to the American Southwest.

1a – Leave Nic Roy Alone

Seriously, there were four other shooters before this kid, and his Instagram is a tire fire right now from pissy Canadians sore losers.

2 – Don’t Forget That We Invented Hockey, Yankee Scum

Every Team USA win over Canada eventually results in this default reaction from Canadians, in which America (or really every other hockey nation) is a cute little puppy playing with its food, completely unaware that CANADA POURED THE FOOD AND PURCHASED THE BOWL AND PAID FOR THE ADOPTION AND ALSO INVENTED DOGS.

Some of this is overt, where Canadians literally say things like “nice win, but it’s still our game/ice/heritage/whatever.” But true masters of the craft like my friend Ken Campbell of The Hockey News are a lot more devious, sending out Trojan Horse appreciations of the game with Canadian hubris hiding in its innards.

3 – Team USA Is Screwed Without Alex DeBrincat

You’ve never even watched him play and you thought his name was “DeBrindicat” until about a week ago. Idiot.

4 – Shootouts Suuuuuuck

Usually, the frustration and introspective outrage from Canada is focused inward, on which players in the NHL should have been on the world junior team but weren’t, or holding a special summit on the state of goaltending in the country.

But knowing that Connor McDavid wasn’t walking through that door, and knowing Carter Hart wasn’t the problem last night, it was time to aim that energy in a different direction:

The. Dang. Shootout.

Now, shootouts suck. We all know this. If there’s one unifying opinion between American and Canadian fans, it’s that we hope the wall between our nations won’t be too high where we can’t fly over it, but also that shootouts are atrocious and not the way to end any championship game.

But maybe the shootout criticism went a tad too far in the emotional aftermath:

(Whispers: I wouldn’t…)

5 – Wait, Crap, No, Actually There’s Still Going To Be A Special Summit On The State Of Goaltending In The Country.

Plan accordingly.

6 – Never Joke About Canadian Hypocrisy

Here was my trash opinion of the night:

Now, this was meant to be a poke at the fact that shootouts are sometimes simply the bee’s knees for Canadian fans when they play into native son myth-making, like Toews in 2007, but it morphed into a hell-scape of indignant Toews fans (“Ya because Toews was a one trick pony just like Henderson … my twitter feed was full of gracious losers and one sore winner…you!”) and, much more disturbingly, a collection of people who felt that Toews’ championship success was basically a golden ticket for the Hall of Fame.

I know winning championships is super important for one’s legacy, an opinion that Alex Ovechkin will no doubt second, but the idea that “winning” should be paramount in determining an individual honor like the Hall of Fame is what gets you Glenn Anderson in there.

(Chris Osgood, one can argue, at least affected play for full games rather than a third of one.)

Stanley Cups and gold medals should be window dressing on a player’s overall criteria for immortality, like finding out that on top of great hair and a winning personality your boyfriend can speak three languages (and one of them is Italian).

7 – This Was The Best Game Ever

Look, that world junior gold medal game was amazing. Simply amazing. We know this because of the undeniable drama on the ice, and we know this because it somehow made #WJC2017 the top trending topic on Twitter for most of the evening, which is astounding even for the digitally plugged-in game of hockey.

But …

… we just got over the recency bias from the last Best Game Ever, the Team North America win over Sweden in the World Cup.

Also, please refer back to No. 3: No ‘Best Game Ever’ can be won in a shootout.

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Greg Wyshynski is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter. His book, TAKE YOUR EYE OFF THE PUCK, is available on Amazon and wherever books are sold.

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