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To win a sevens tournament, lots has to go right.

There’s executing your game to a T, there’s the bounce of the ball, but at the core of it, there’s making your hits and taking your chances.

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Canada won the Sydney 7s, the most recent stop on the World Rugby Women’s Sevens Series, but that’s old news, says head coach John Tait.

“Haven’t really said much about it,” he said Thursday, a day ahead of his squad’s first game of the USA Sevens in Las Vegas. (Watch live at worldrugby.org.) “Although we won last tournament we didn’t play near the level we should have on attack. Defence stepped up and made the difference.”

Canada’s game is all about “ball movement and a physical defence,” Tait told Postmedia last month.

In Sydney, the Canadians defeated the host Australians — also the defending gold medallists from Rio — because of the latter. Their defence was suffocating and nearly flawless.

In Las Vegas, Canada faces a tricky pool with both Russia and France in the mix, along with qualifiers Argentina. The Russians and the French have proved troublesome for Canada the last two seasons, and the opener against the Russians was noted by Tait (kickoff: 9:01 a.m. Friday).