MJPA: USA Field Hockey U21 Men Down Cuba, Power into Jr. Pan Am Semifinals  x2
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| US Field Hockey |
February 23, 2005 
US Field Hockey Association
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Colorado Springs, Colo.— The USA Field Hockey men's Under-21 team took advantage of goals by Danny Jordan (Camarillo, Calif.) and Pat Harris (Moorpark, Calif.) to down host Cuba, 2-1 and power into the semifinals of the Junior Pan American Championships in Havana.
With the win, the USA men earned the number two seed in Pool A behind pool champion Argentina. Chile holds the top seed in Pool B entering the final day of pool play on Wednesday and will be the USA's likely opponent when the semifinals get underway on Saturday, Feb. 26.
The spot in the semifinals also puts the USA men within one win of earning a berth in the Junior World Cup, June 29-July 10 in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. The top three teams from the Pan Am tournament are expected to qualify for the Junior World Cup. The USA men have qualified for the Junior World Cup only once (1989) in the seven previous editions of the quadrennial event.
Playing before a vocal partisan crowd, the USA opened the scoring in the first half when Jordan connected on a field goal to give his team an early 1-0 lead. Cuba answered with a penalty stroke goal late in the half to send the game to halftime knotted at 1-1.
Early in the second half, Harris collected his eighth goal of the tournament off a penalty corner goal for a 2-1 USA advantage. The USA defense and goalkeeper Jeb Saez (Thousand Oaks, Calif.) then shutdown the Cubans for the remainder of the half to send the USA to the semifinals.
"The defense played really well," said USA Coach Nick Conway on his team's second half performance. "This was a great team win against a very intense opponent, but we still have some work to do. "
USA 2, Cuba 1
USA: Danny Jordan (FG, 4:00)
CUB: Orlando Quirola (PS, 34:00)
USA: Pat Harris (PC, 41:00)
Cuba: Leodan Hernández (GK); Yasmany Gutiérrez, Dunior Caballero, Lazaro Aguilera, Yuri González; Jeancel Barzaga, Walberto Olivares, Ramon Risquet; Ivan Makenci, Orlando Quirola and Yendri Herrera. Also played: Dieguez and Castillo. Coach: Yumai Oliva.
United States : Jeb Saez GK),Sean Harris, Ryan Sherburne, Malachi Mahan, Zach Freundlich; Pat Harris, Jon Ginolfi, Emadd Farooqui; Richie Jordan, Danny Jordan and Jeb Cunningham. Also played: Jaspan Grenwall, Austin Pile, Jacob Schlosser and Colin Scally.
Coach: Nick Conway.
Umpires: Thomas Gantz (Chile) and Germán Montes de Oca (Argentina).
Cards - Yellow card: 32:00, R. Jordan (USA); 45:00, Mahan (USA); 60:00, Olivares (CUB); 65:00, Gutiérrez (CUB). Green: 6:00, González (CUB); 13:00, Barzaga (CUB).
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