from Lance Hornby of the Toronto Sun,

If Team Europe is ‘Cinderella’ as their World Cup fairy-tale run is being called, Canada is the Big Bad Wolf.

As they prepare to meet each other in the first game of their best-of-three final Tuesday, don’t expect a happy ending.

Yet even if the Euro pucksters are swept, which became a greater possibility when Marian Gaborik pulled out of the tournament Monday with a leg injury, it has been a pretty good story.

Almost a year to the day since Franz Reidl stood at the ACC with no team or hierarchy and said how great it would be for 200 million non-traditional hockey fans in Europe if his unknowns made some noise, they’ve now made it past the U.S., Czech Republic and Sweden.

“At the beginning, the belief was not there,” team president Reidl agreed. “It was all about (coming here), maybe having a couple of good games and c’est la vie. So now the impact is great. I’m receiving messages from small (hockey) countries; Georgia, Portugal, Mexico. The smaller nations have this hope that somebody can do with a united group what we did.”

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