(WGR Sports Radio 550) - It was Tage Thompson and the United States advancing to the Semifinal Round at the 2026 Winter Olympics on Wednesday after defeating Rasmus Dahlin and Sweden, 2-1 in overtime.
It was a disappointing outcoming for Dahlin, as his second Olympic Games are now finished.
In the second period, Team USA struck first when Dylan Larkin (Detroit Red Wings) tipped home a Jack Hughes (New Jersey Devils) shot from the point, with Thompson charging the net.
This goal will be a bitter one for Dahlin, because he stepped up after Larkin won the faceoff and allowed him to get by him.
The score remained 1-0 until Sweden pulled goaltender Jacob Markstrom (Devils) for the extra attacker.
Sweden’s best player in this tournament, Lucas Raymond (Red Wings), made a gorgeous cross-ice pass to Mika Zibanejad (New York Rangers), and he ripped a one-timer past U.S. netminder Connor Hellebuyck (Winnipeg Jets) to send the game to overtime.
Team USA had all six shots in overtime, with Markstrom standing on his head.
However, the Swedish netminder got fooled from the slot when he thought Quinn Hughes (Minnesota Wild) was going to shoot to his right, but scored off the post to his left.
Hughes' overtime heroics punched Team USA's ticket to the next round on Friday, where they will take on Slovakia.
The Slovaks earned their berth to the Semifinals with a 6-2 victory over Germany.
Both goaltenders were stellar on Wednesday, with Markstrom making 37 saves and Hellebuyck making 28 saves.
Hellebuyck leads all goalies in the tournament with a 0.98 goals-against average and a .958 save percentage, to go along with a perfect 3-0-0 record.
Finland’s Jusse Saros (Nashville Predators) is also 3-0-0 with a 1.49 goals-against average and a .938 save percentage. Then Canada’s Jordan Binnington (St. Louis Blues) is 3-0-0 with a 1.65 goals-against average and a .922 save percentage.
Dahlin finished his Olympics with a goal and four assists for five points, and was plus-4 in five games played.
Sweden head coach Sam Hallam - who should be fired - decided to only play Dahlin 19:19 on Wednesday, and way overplayed Erik Karlsson (Pittsburgh Penguins), who was on the ice for 27:26. Just like the 4 Nations Face-Off, Dahlin never saw the ice in overtime, and Karlsson was caught standing around watching the overtime winning goal.
That same scenario played out in two overtimes for Sweden in the 4 Nations tournament.
Victor Hedman (Tampa Bay Lightning) got hurt during pregame warmups and just sat on the bench the whole game and didn’t play.
As for Raymond, he finished the Quarterfinal Round tied for second in overall scoring for the tournament with Canada’s Macklin Celebrini (San Jose Sharks). Raymond had nine points (1+8) in five games.
Connor McDavid (Edmonton Oilers) is still the tournament's leading scorer with 11 points (2+9) in four games.
Speaking of Team Canada, they had to go to overtime against Czechia without captain Sidney Crosby (Penguins), who left the game in the second period favoring his right knee.
Nick Suzuki (Montreal Canadiens) took Crosby’s place on his line, and ended up sending the game to overtime with a game-tying tip-in goal with just 3:27 left.
Then in overtime, 19-year-old Celebrini found Mitch Marner (Vegas Golden Knights) streaking up the middle, and he walked in and put a nice move on Czech netminder Lukas Dostal (Anaheim Ducks) to send Canada to the Semifinal Round against Finland.
As for the Finns, they beat Switzerland in overtime, 3-2, after trailing 2-0 for most of the contest.
After Sebastian Aho (Carolina Hurricanes) scored to get Finland on the board with 6:06 remaining in regulation, the Finns continued to battle and finally found pay dirt when defenseman Miro Heiskanen (Dallas Stars) tied the game with 1:12 left on the clock.
Then in the overtime, forward Artturi Lehkonen (Colorado Avalanche) got behind the Swiss defense and buried his breakaway chance past goalie Leonardo Genoni.
The first Semifinal Round matchup on Friday between Canada and Finland is slated for 10:40 a.m. EST, while the second game between Team USA and Slovakia will take place at 3:10 p.m. EST.
The losers of both games will face off for the bronze medal on Saturday at 2:40 p.m. EST.
The Gold Medal Game is then slated for 8:10 a.m. EST on Sunday to close out the Winter Olympics.
Related
