Today at 12:00 p.m. ET, Canada and Austria faceoff in men's ice hockey Group B action live from the Bolshoy Ice Dome in Sochi as part of the 2014 Winter Olympics. The game can be live streamed here.
Canada is coming off of a 3-1 win over Norway on Thursday while Austria will be in need of a win after falling 8-4 to Finland on Thursday.
Canada will have a new look in between the pipes as Roberto Luongo of the Vancouver Canucks will man the crease. Luongo led Team Canada to the gold medal at the 2010 Vancouver Games. Mike Smith (Phoenix Coyotes) will back up Luongo while Carey Price (Montreal Canadiens), who won the opener for Team Canada, will not dress.
Luongo is 19-16-6 through 42 games this season for the Canucks, with a 2.38 goals-against average and a .917 save percentage.
Canada blew away Norway 8-0 four years ago, but had a tougher time putting them away on Thursday.
"It was tighter than we thought. We knew they were going to come out hard," defenseman Duncan Keith of the Chicago Blackhawks said, according to ESPN. "I thought for a first game it was good. We just kept getting better as the game went on."
Canada will substitute in defenseman P.K. Subban (Canadiens) and forward Matt Duchene (Colorado Avalanche) into action for forward Patrick Sharp (Chicago Blackhawks) and blueliner Dan Hamhuis (Canucks), who will be healthy scratches.
The Austrians scored early against Finland by notching a goal just 36 seconds in and they also had an early 2-1 lead, but things took a turn after that and the team eventually fell.
"In case we didn't know what we were up against, we got a reality check," Austrian forward Thomas Vanek, whose New York Islanders teammate Michael Grabner was the one who lit the lamp 36 seconds in, told NHL.com. "You've got to play a certain way and I think we didn't do it. Our goalie needs to be our best player and we need to help him more."
Vanek has appeared in 57 games between the Islanders and Buffalo Sabres this season, and has notched 49 points off of 19 goals and 30 assists.
Grabner finished with a hat trick but the team still fell.
"It's always nice and fun to score goals, but at the same time you want to win games," Grabner said, according to NHL.com. "Unfortunately [Thursday] we gave them too many chances and they capitalized on most of them. When you get scored on in the last minute it gets the morale of the team down a little bit and then you have to work it back up. But it is tough against a team like that that is so skilled and so fast."
Canada and Austria go head-to-head when the puck drops at the Bolshoy Ice Dome in Sochi as part of the 2014 Winter Olympic Games.
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