I had set a goal with my team to try and get back to the top of the rankings, but I never thought with the depth in the game this year that I would have been able to get it back so quickly.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
It took putting one foot in front of the other every single day to get through it to the point where I made it back on the team and won a gold medal in 2008.
When you can score three goals without the most prolific scorer in the world, you know you have a lot of depth, and it gives you confidence.
It takes the pressure off of your better players to know they don't always have to be on top of their game for the team to do well.
I'm not saying I didn't have ample time to recover, ample time to get to my best, I felt this year I did fine. When I stepped on the field for the national team, I was ready and able to make an impact, to score goals, to create chances.
We have deep depth.
Do I have more depth than I'm given credit for? No!
Sometimes that happens. I know how it feels to lose eight or nine to nothing. It can be frustrating but it was good for us. This was a team that was hot the last nine games. It seemed like any puck we touched went our way.
My thought has always been completion. Maybe you have to rebound better, shoot better, hit free throws, handle the ball, defend better. You have to do all those things in the course of a game.
The game has its ups and downs, but you can never lose focus of your individual goals and you can't let yourself be beat because of lack of effort.
As I said this year, I didn't try to put any pressure on me by setting high goals or anything, I just want to make sure that every single time I'm out there on the court I do my best, I give 100%, and see where it's going to end up next year.