Dan McCoy and US sled hockey team take gold in Sochi

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Dan McCoy and the U.S. Paralympic Sled Hockey team won a gold medal on Saturday night in Sochi, Russia.

The 1-0 victory over the host nation secured the Paralympics Games’ top prize for the 20-year-old and his teammates. It was the team’s second-straight Paralympic triumph, having also achieved a first-place finish in Vancouver, Canada, four years ago.

McCoy, a Cheswick, Pa., native and Pitt student, logged 6:15 on the ice in the final to cap his first time competing at the event, the highest level of disability sport. 

A forward on the team, he was one of 17 people on the roster that went to Sochi.

While there, he played in three of the team’s five games, most notably assisting on two goals in a 3-0 victory over South Korea in pool play. He finished the tournament with a plus-minus of three in 21:42 of ice time.

The result also avenged a defeat in the team’s last group-stage game, 2-1.   

The sport, known as sledge hockey abroad, featured seven other nations, including bronze medalist Canada, who the Americans shut out in the semifinals, 3-0.

McCoy, a second-year rehabilitation science major, is not in school this semester, having devoted his time to training on his own and with the team prior to the competition.

He returned to Pittsburgh on Sunday.