A United States women’s hockey team already being hailed as one of the best ever assembled is right where they expected to be: playing for Olympic gold. The Americans brushed aside Sweden 5-0 in the first of Monday’s semi-finals, setting the stage for a potential seventh gold-medal showdown with Canada.
Twenty years ago, almost to the day, the USA women absorbed one of the great Olympic shocks when Sweden stunned them in a shootout just down the A4 autostrada in Torino, ending a streak of 25 straight losses to the Americans during which they’d been outscored 187-29. There would be no such ambush this time, even if Sweden coach Ulf Lundberg had suggested the US team were “just human beings” and might not have been overly keen on facing his team in the semi-finals.
The US dominated possession from the opening faceoff and struck first after six minutes when defender Cayla Barnes whipped a snap shot from the edge of the right circle into the top-right corner, marking the sixth straight game in which the Americans have scored in the opening period.
The well-drilled Swedes defended doggedly enough through 35 minutes until the Americans finally broke it open.Taylor Heise made it 2-0 with a one-timer off a pass from Hannah Bilka. Then Abbey Murphy and Kendall Coyne Schofield scored in a 58-second span, prompting Lundberg to pull first-choice goaltender Ebba Svensson Traff for Emma Söderberg. Less than two minutes later, Hayley Scamurra tapped in Britta Curl-Salemme’s centering pass to make it 5-0, all but sealing the Americans’ fifth straight appearance in the Olympic final.
“We’ve just been taking it game by game, period by period, shift by shift,” said Coyne Schofield, who is playing in her fourth Olympics. “Just focusing on what we did well and what we can improve on. It’s a big win tonight and we’re right where we want to be going into the gold-medal game.”
US goaltender Aerin Frankel was brilliant when called upon, turning away 23 shots for her fourth win and third shutout of the tournament. The 26-year-old Olympic debutante, along with Gwyneth Philips and Ava McNaughton, has combined for five straight clean sheets and a scoreless streak of more than 331 straight minutes entering Thursday’s final.
“The team is playing so well defensively they are making my job easy by making the plays in front of me so predictable so I can do my job,” Frankel said. “It’s hard to zoom out while you’re here and look at the big picture. When we look back on this tournament, what we have done so far has been amazing. But the job is not done yet.”
The Americans’ defensive dominance has almost been overshadowed by their high-octane attack – 31 goals, 259 shots on goal and 15 different goalscorers through six games – but the ability to roll four lines and attack relentlessly starts with the security in net. The US have conceded just the one goal and have yet to trail or be tied after 0-0 throughout the competition.
Along the concourses of the brand-new 14,700-seat arena on Milan’s southeastern edge, hordes of well-lubricated US supporters in hockey sweaters, bald eagle costumes and every variety of star-spangled regalia waved flags and stacked pyramids from €7 pony beers as “U-S-A!” chants echoed before, during and after the goals. Many were ticketed for Monday’s later session, when Canada will face Switzerland for the right to play the US for the gold.
If Canada make the final, the US will go off as hot favorites to beat their old rivals. Since dethroning the Canadians at last year’s world championships on Tessa Janecke’s overtime goal, the US have won five straight in the head-to-head by a 29-7 margin, including a 5-0 group-stage win last Tuesday. The two teams have split all seven Olympic gold medals since women’s ice hockey debuted at Nagano, with the US winning in 1998 and 2018 and Canada claiming the other five.
