CRIS BOURONCLE / AFP/Getty Images

Canada's forward Sidney Crosby (L) and Canada's goalkeeper Martin Brodeur (2ndR) congratulate USA's forward Jamie Langenbrunner and USA's goalkeeper Ryan Miller at the end of the Men's preliminary Ice Hockey match Canada against USA at the XXI Winter Olympic games in Vancouver's Canada Hockey Place on February 21, 2010. USA won 5-3.

OPINION

By Craig Custance

updated 12:47 a.m. ET Feb. 26, 2010

VANCOUVER - The Canadians have arrived.

The early favorites to win Olympic hockey gold nearly sent an entire country into panic with their slow start. But now the panic has turned to celebration — at least for one night.

Canada crushed Russia 7-3 in a quarterfinals game on Wednesday, sending home a team most observers expected to contend for gold.

"All we've done now is set ourselves up for a chance," Canada coach Mike Babcock said.

They've also started reclaiming their national game. The rout of Russia was nice. Redemption against the Americans and a gold medal would be even better. Thanks to Team USA's 2-0 win over Switzerland on Wednesday, there's a good possibility that a USA-Canada championship game will be played on Sunday.

Just one more win for each country is needed.

"It's pretty obvious (hockey) is the world's game, but we still think it's ours," Babcock said after the win over Russia. "It's going to be one country's game this year. We try to prove on a regular basis it's going to be ours."

To get a much-anticipated United States-Canada rematch, both need to survive semifinal games on Friday:

United States vs. Finland, 3 p.m. ET
The Americans can return to the gold medal game for the first time since 2002 with a win over the 2006 silver medal winners. Finland shut out the Czech Republic 2-0 on Wednesday, setting up the game Anaheim teammates Bobby Ryan (USA) and Teemu Selanne (Finland) discussed with anticipation during a long phone conversation on Tuesday.

"I'd love to take a couple runs at (Selanne)," Ryan said. "I'm sure if he can return the favor, he would."

Canada vs. Slovakia, 9:30 p.m. ET
Sidney Crosby didn't sound like he was going to linger on the win over Russia for very long.

"We won a quarterfinal game and it happened to be against Russia," he said. "It was a great battle for us, we wanted that game and we move forward."

Forward means a showdown with Slovakia, a team that showed just how dangerous it can be with a 4-3 upset over Sweden last night.

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