It's taken virtually her entire life to get to these 60 minutes.
Everything that Meghan Duggan and her US Women's Hockey teammates have worked for comes down to tonight in Vancouver, when the eyes of the entire hockey world will be upon them as they battle host Canada for the gold medal at the XXI Olympic Winter Games.
"I hope that I have the game of my life (tonight)," the 22-year-old Duggan said yesterday afternoon from the Olympic Village in Vancouver. "I just need to be the player I've been my entire life; do the things that have gotten me to be the player I am.
"Really, we have to treat this like any other game. We can't put it on a pedestal and be scared to win a gold medal."
The Danvers native, who has four goals in her team's four Olympic games, will line up as the first line left winger once again for the Americans tonight as they attempt to win their first gold medal in women's hockey since 1998. The game begins at Canada Hockey Place at 3:30 p.m. (6:30 p.m. EST).
Among her many highlights playing international hockey, Duggan has been on four different teams that beat Canada to win a title: the 2008 and 2009 IIHF Women's World Championships, the 2008 Women's Four Nations Cup and, most recently, the 2009 Hockey Canada Cup.
The U.S. and Canadian women met 10 times leading up to the Olympic Games (the U.S. won 3 of those games), so there are no secrets between the arch rivals.
"We know them inside and out, and they do us, too," Duggan said. "What (tonight) will come down to is who wants it more and who shows up best prepared to play."
If anything, said Duggan, it's Canada who will be feeling the pressure more than the Americans. Although both teams have blitzed their way past any and all competition en route to tonight's title tilt, it's the host country that come in as the two-time defending Olympic champions and hungry to add a third in front of their countrymen.
Aside from a 5 or 10-minute stretch after one of their practices was completed, Duggan said she hasn't seen Canada play live at all. In fact, the mantra of the U.S. team isn't to focus so much on what the Canadians plan on doing tonight, but rather sticking to their own game plan and forcing them to adjust, not vice versa.
"We can't get caught trying to worry about what they're going to do," said Duggan. "We want to be on the attack from the get-go, be on the front of our skates and go right at them. If we can get the jump on them early, that's a huge advantage for us."
Calling the experience of actually being a part of the Games "surreal", Duggan and her teammates have been able to enjoy some downtime and meet some of the other U.S. athletes, such as gold medal snowboarder Shaun White.
"For me, outside of the actual competition the most amazing thing was the Opening Ceremonies," Duggan said. "Marching into the stadium with 200 people from your country, all dressed alike, and knowing that 3 billion people are watching — it really filled up your heart. We were all crying."
Duggan will not only have tens of thousands of fans back home on the North Shore cheering her on tonight, but also has a large support system in Vancouver that watch this history-making contest live. They include her parents, Bob and Mary; her siblings, Katelyn and Bryan; her brother's girlfriend, Kate Donoghue; her mother's siblings Karen, Patrick, Tommy and Jimmy (and his wife, Sue); and her cousins Julie, Grace and Sean.
"I can't wait (for tonight)," Duggan said. "It's going to be the biggest game of our lives. Hopefully, it ends the way we all want it to."
