Winter Olympic Games 2018 Official Countdown Thread

[hckošice 14,836]

Ice Hockey Tournaments at Salt Lake 2002

Canada,

2002 Olympic Champions,

after defeating the host USA 5-2 in the memorable Gold medal match ended the 50 years long wait for the Olympic gold

 

 

The Ice Hockey tournaments at the Salt Lake Winter Olympic Games 2002, were held from 9th to 24th February 2002 and took place at the E-Center in West Valley City and at the Peaks Arena in Provo, Utah, United States. Both tournaments were won by Canada, and in both occasions after the Gold Medal match win over the host country, the United States, Women´s defeating the reigning Olympic champions 3-2, in a Canadian successful  revenge from Nagano 1998, Sweden took the Bronze. Canada won also the men´s gold beating USA 5-2 in an epic final and finally ending a long 50 years period of waiting for the Olympic gold for the Ice Hockey birth country, Russia took the bronze medals after beating the biggest surprise of the tournament team Belarus 7-2.

 

This was the second historic Olympic tournament including the NHL players. as the National Hockey League agreed to organize a 12 days break during the Olympics, but Once again, they controversially did not allowed their players to play in the preliminary round !!! So once again this extremely affected especially Slovakia, the team had to play the preliminary round with only 13 players !!! waiting for their 10 top NHL players for the main round, but unfortunately this tactic didn´t worked at all, Slovakia experienced a disastrous tournament finishing last in the preliminary round, so paradoxically the team was allowed to use their stars only in the match for 13th place, and the team with all its stars defeated France 7-1. Thankfully this idiotic and absolutely unfair system was later changed and in Torino 4 years later all teams were equal and all allowed to profit of their NHL players from the start. This was done especially because of Slovakia´s complaints,

The funny thing is that few months later, Slovakia became World Champion.

 

14 Teams entered the tournament with the same illogical format as 4 years ago in Nagano, the top 6 Ice Hockey powerhouses Canada, Russia, Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic and USA were directly seeded in the main round, all other countries had to play a preliminary round. The 8 remaining teams were divided into 2 four teams preliminary groups, Germany and surprisingly Belarus won their respective groups and advanced to the main round.

 

In the main phase, Canada had a bad start in the group finishing only third, beating only the qualifier Germany  and losing to Sweden. The Swedes won the group unbeaten and suddenly became the biggest top favorites, Czech Republic the reigning champions finished second ahead of Canada and pointless Germany,

The Group B was surprisingly won by the home team, USA, which wasn´t really considered as a medal contender before the tourney. Finland finished second and Russia third, the biggest underdog Belarus finished as expected last losing all 3 games clearly.

 

So the quarterfinals were set. USA vs Germany, Finland vs Canada, Czech republic vs Russia and Sweden vs Belarus.

 

In a replay of the Nagano 1998 final, the Czechs again met the Russian, this time again the result was 1-0 but this time for the Russians, eliminating the reigning champions by a goal of Maxim Afinogenov. Canada vs Finland was another jewel of the Ice Hockey history, the Canadians managed to win this great battle thanks goals from Sakic and Yzermann 2-1. USA defeated Germany easily 5-0 to reach the semifinals and in the last match it was expected that Sweden will defeat Belarus easily too...but, in this game happened probably the biggest upset since the 1980 Miracle in Ice. Belarus shocked the world beating Sweden full of NHL top stars by a incredible goal 3 minutes to go by a certain Kopat scored from the Central zone against the great Salo.

 

The biggest surprise of the tournament was without any doubts, Team Belarus, one of the most memorable moment of the whole Olympic history came in the 57th minute of the Quarterfinal against Sweden full of NHL top stars and the crazy goal from the central zone that brought to the scorer Vladimir Kopat the eternal glory

 

The Vladimir Kopat goal

Spoiler

 

It was also the end of this incredible fairy tale, Belarus in the semifinals logically had to submit to the Canadians 1-7. The second semifinal was another story a epic match between USA and Russia on American soil, exactly the same day after 22 years from the legendary Miracle on Ice. And this was a fantastic match, The host won 3-2 and did qualified for the final, proving they are just incredibly successful at home Olympics. 

 

For both nations, the gold-medal game came coincidentally on the anniversary of each nation's last gold medal in men's Olympic hockey. Canada last won 50 years previously at the Oslo 1952 WOG. The US won their last gold medal when they defeated Finland two days after "The Miracle on Ice" in 1980. Both games, coincidentally, were played on a Sunday.

 

The match was tied 2-2 after two periods, but in the last frame Canada scored 3 more goals by Joe Sakic and Jarome Iginla to beat the host 5-2 and won its 6th Olympic Gold, first after 50 years.

 

Don Cherry jokes just prior to touching the 'Lucky Loonie' to wish good luck to the men's and women's Olympic hockey teams before the 2010 Vancouver Olympics at the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto.

The Lucky Loonie was buried surreptitiously by Canadian ice-maker Trent Evans at centre ice before the men's and women's 2002 Olympic Ice Hockey tournaments in Salt Lake City. After Team Canada's second hockey Gold Medal victory, the Lucky Loonie was dug up and presented to Team Canada General Manager Wayne Gretzky. Gretzky then donated the Lucky Loonie to the Hockey Hall of Fame

 

The Salt Lake Olympic tournament will remains in Slovak memory as one of the biggest waste and another disastrous experience our hockey had to pass. The rules were knon before the tournament we can use all our top NHL stars as Demitra, Marián Hossa, Šatan, Višňovský, Stumpel, Bartečko, Handzuš, Pálffy etc... officially only from the main round, but first we must qualify for this second round, the problem was we could enter only 25 players, so the team staff had to make a hard decision and select only 15 players for the preliminary round, some stars like Demitra succeeded with requests to their NHL club owners to play 1 or 2 matches if at this time their club did not played in NHL, this is the case of Demitra who travelled the night after his club played a NHL game to play against Latvia in the preliminary rounds second match but then had again to fly throughout the whole America to rejoin his club and play the last match before the NHL break. In this situation our team totally flopped. Finishing in embarasing and humiliating last place of the group after losing in the opening match to Germany 0-3 and in the last match to Austria with only 11 players in our bench 2-3. Our only point in the preliminary round came in the tire 6-6 against Latvia thanks to a fantastic Pavol Demitra.

The last place meant our team will play only 1 game the humiliating 13th place match. But our NHLers showed pride and honor and all decided to stay and play this match to show everyone what a injustice was done to us. The match was absolutely one sided, we won against France 7-1 and finished 13th.

 

After this tournament came 2 great news for our hockey, IOC, IIHF and NHL agreed that from 2006 all NHLers will be allowed to play for their teams since the start of the competition.

The second one..few months later in this 2002 year, this same Slovakia became World Champion.

 

 

Final Ranking of the Men´s Tournament:

1. Canada 

2. United States 

3. Russia 

4. Belarus

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Sweden  -  Main Tournament

6. Finland -  Main Tournament

7. Czech Republic  -  Main Tournament

8. Germany -  Main Tournament

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

9. Latvia - First Phase

10. Ukraine - First Phase

11. Switzerland - First Phase

12. Austria - First Phase

13. Slovakia - First Phase

14. France - First Phase

 

 

4 Years after losing to the USA in Nagano Olympic final,

Canada took its revenge winning the final 3-2 to become for the first time the Womens Olympic champion

 

 

 

The 2002 Olympic women's ice hockey tournament was played by 8 Nations, increasing the amount of participants by 2 teams.

 

The 8 Nations were divided into two preliminary groups, the top 2 from both groups advanced to the semifinals. All 4 favorites made the cut without any problem, Canada and Sweden from Group A and USA with Finland from Group B.

 

Canada and USA reached as expected the final winning easily also their semifinals against the Nordic duo. Sweden won then the derby against Finland 2-1 to grab the bronze medals. In the final Canada defeated USA 3-2 to win its first Olympic gold.

 

 

Final Ranking of the Women´s Tournament:

1. Canada   

2. United States   

3. Sweden 

4. Finland

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Russia

6. Germany

7. China

8. Kazakhstan

 

Highlights form the Men´s Final

Canada vs USA 5-2

Spoiler

 

[rybak 3,218]

 30 days left!!! 

[hckošice 14,836]

Ice Hockey Tournaments at Torino 2006

Sweden,

2006 Olympic Champions,

won their second Olympic title 12 years after the Lillehammer triumph

 

 

 

The Ice Hockey tournaments at the 2006 Winter Olympic Games took place from 11th to 26th February 2006 in Torino, Italy. The games were played at the Palasport Olympico and at the Torino Esposizioni.

 

Sweden won the men´s tournament, winning its second historic Olympic title after 12 years, Finland won silver and the Czech Republic took the Bronze medals. Canada retained its gold in the women´s tournament ahead of Sweden and the USA.

 

Before the men´s tournament, there were many changes that occured in the format and system of the tournament. The format was changed and returned back to the one used in 1992 and 1994, meaning only two phases contested, the preliminary Round and then the Knock-Out round. Also the number of participating teams was reduced from 14 to 12 to form the two preliminary 6 teams groups A and B, and only the top 4 from both pools advanced to the quarterfinals.

 

But the most important change was about the NHL policy, this was the 3rd consecutive tournament with the participation of NHL players, but the first ever in which they were allowed to play during the whole tournament, so all teams had finally the same equal opportunities and conditions, which helped especially Slovakia, who had at this time more than 30 players in the NHL but can unable to use them in 1998 and 2002.

 

In the preliminary round the 12 participating Nations were divided into 2 groups, after a round-robin games only 2 teams finished unbeaten and advanced to the KO phase with the full amount of 10 points from 5 wins in 5 matches, Finland in Group A and Slovakia in Group B.

The Fins won all their group matches to top the pool ahead of Switzerland (the biggest surprise of this group) that defeated Canada 2-0 and Czech Republic 4-2. Thanks a better head to head the Swiss finished second ahead of Canada, the fourth qualified team was the Czech Republic, not really impressive in the preliminary round, but later in tournament showing what they are capable to do, flying to the Bronze medals. Germany and the host Italy finished their campaign both with 2 points from two draws in the preliminary stage.

Slovakia surprisingly dominated in the group B, winning all 5 matches, but the last game against Sweden will be for eternity known thanks its controversy. Several Allegations have surfaced of Sweden throwing a game against Slovakia so the Swedes would face Switzerland instead of Canada or the Czech Republic. Even 5 years later Pater Forsberg  was interpreted to insinuate that Sweden lost this game on purpose, so as to draw Switzerland as their quarterfinal opponent, rather than Canada or the Czech Republic. However Sweden lost 0-3 to Slovakia and finished 3rd in the group to face the Swiss in the play-offs, and they succeeded starting a run that finished by winning the gold medals. Russia from 2nd place and the United States from the 4th rank completed the Slovaks and Swedes in the quarterfinals positions. Kazakhstan and Latvia  finished behind the qualifying places with 2 and 1 points respectively.

 

The quarterfinals pairings brought some exciting encounters as Finland vs USA, Switzerland vs Sweden and the most awaited Russia vs Canada and the derby Slovakia vs Czech Republic.

 

Sweden won over the Swiss easily 6-2 stopping the great Swiss fairy tale. All other matches were really tense and extremely entertaining, Russia defeated in the clash of titans Canada 2-0, Finland outskated the United States 4-3 and The Czech Republic ended the road for the Slovaks beating them as the history learn us once again at the Olympics, this time 3-1.

 

The dream of Russia to finally won gold was again closed just like in Lillehammer 1994 by Finland, The "Suomis" playing until then a perfect tournament won clearly 4-0 and awaited their final opponent, it will be their eternal rivals, Sweden. The "Tre Kronor" defeated in the second semifinal the Czechs 7-3.

 

Czech Republic then beat the frustrated Russians 3-0 to grab the Bronze medals. In the final match Sweden became the only team in the whole tournament to beat Finland, with a win 3-2 the Swedes coached by Bengt-Ake Gustafsson and lead by offensive stars like Forsberg, Daniel Andersson, Mats Sundin, Henrik Zetterberg or the Sedin brothers and absolute defencers super stars like Kronwall, Bäckman or Lidstrom won the second Gold medals in the history.

 

One of the strongest ever Swede team celebrating the Olympic title after the final win 3-2 against Finland

 

The expectations in Slovakia was huge prior the tournament, finally we was able to use a complete team composed of our big NHL stars, and with enormous motivation to show to the whole world what injustice were made to us in the previous years we entered the tournament like a hurricane.

And what a start it was. A epic and legendary performance from our guys in the first match against Russia, Slovakia won one of the best ever hockey games 5-3 thanks two fantastic late goals from Marián Gáborík.

This win brought a huge boost to the players and fans, we won the next match against latvia 6-4, relatively closing the game in the first period, when we was already leading 4-1.

Game 3 and win 3, this time 2-1 over the United States in another great game after another fabulous effort.

The team with Marián Hossa, Pavol Demitra, Marián Gáborík, Miroslav Šatan, Žigmund Pálffy and Peter Bondra showed its power also in the remaining group matches beating Kazakhstan 2-1 and Sweden in the last game 3-0. 12 years after Lillehammer 1994 Slovakia again won the preliminary round, this time without losing a single point !

The atmosphere in the team and in the country was just incredible, peoples started to think about medal, maybe even gold, but then came the fall.

The Quarterfinal against our former federation partners, the Czech Republic. The team that practically showed nothing in the preliminary roun, suddenly re-found its power and traditional shape, it was clearly another Czech team we faced that evening. They best match in the tournament resulted in their win 3-1 and the end of the dream for us.

Anyway the 5th place from Torino 2006 was at that time best result ever under the five ring...until 4 years ago came Vancouver, but thats another story to come ...

 

 

Final Ranking of the Men´s Tournament:

1. Sweden 

2. Finland 

3. Czech Republic 

4. Russia

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Slovakia

6. Switzerland

7. Canada

8. United States

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

9. Kazakhstan

10. Germany

11. Italy

12. Latvia

 

 

 

Canada,

2006 Women´s Olympic champions, for the second consecutive time

 

 

 

 

The 2006 Women´s Olympic tournament was played with 8 teams, divided into two preliminary groups. The top 2 teams from both pools advanced to the semifinals, the remaining teams continued in the consolation round.

 

This tournament is for the history very known because of an incredible achievement reached by the Swedes. Sweden defeated USA in the semifinals.

 

This win was one of the most important events in the history of international women's ice hockey. It was the first time the US team had lost in an international competition to a team other than Canada. 

 

Canada and USA were the clear absolute favorites of the tournament and both dominated absolutely in their respective groups, the other two semifinalists were the Nordic countries Sweden and Finland. Canada even registered at that time the highest win in a womens Olympic tournament 16-0 over the host Italy, a result they eventually improved 4 years later at home soil.

 

In the semifinals Canada as expected won to reach the final beating Finland 6-0 but in the second semi came the shock. Already the fact that USA-Sweden had to be decided in overtime was a big surprise, but that Sweden will beat the Americans, this was something unthinkable at that time. Sweden won 3-2 in the penalty shootout session to reach the final.

 

USA recovered in the bronze medal match and after winning against Finland 4-0 took at least the Bronze medals. Canada in the Gold Medal match confirmed the role of the favorites and won 4-1.

 

Sweden wrote history in Torino 2006, becoming the first country winning over a North American team in womens Ice Hockey, The goalie Kim Martin savor the huge upset win 3-2 over the US in the semifinals

 

 

 

Final Ranking of the Women´s Tournament:

1. Canada   

2. Sweden     

3. United States   

4. Finland

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Germany

6. Russia

7. Switzerland

8. Italy

 

 

Sweden - Finland 3-2 Mens final Highlights

Spoiler

 

Highlights from the decisive games of the Womens tournament

Spoiler

 

Highlights from all Slovak matches in Torino 2006

Spoiler

 

[hckošice 14,836]

Ice Hockey Tournaments at Vancouver 2010

Canada

,2010 Olympic Champions,

won 8th Olympic title, becoming again the most successful country in men´s Ice Hockey at the Olympics

 

 

The Ice Hockey tournaments at the 2010 Winter Olympic Games took place from 16th to 28th February 2010 in Vancouver, Canada. It was the first ever Olympic Ice Hockey Tournament played in a NHL sized rinks and first ever Olympic Tournament using the 4 referees system. It was the 4th Olympic tournament with participation of NHL players. The matches were contested at the Canada Hockey Place (NHL team Vancouver Canucks home venue the General Motors Place) and at the Thunderbird Arena.

 

12 Teams entered the Men´s Tournament, For this games the format was totally changed and renewed, the 12 countries according their seeding were divided into 3 four teams preliminary Groups. After classical round robins in the different pools the winners of the 3 groups + the best second ranked team received a automatical bye for the next round and has qualified directly for the Quarterfinals, remaining 8 teams had to play a Play-Off Round of 16 game.

 

Canada won the so desired home gold in a total domination´s mode. Supported throughout the entire tournament by fantastic home crowd finished the tourney with a deserved gold, the 8th in history making of Canada the most successful country of all times again, overpassing USSR. USA took silver after a painful Gold Medal Game lose to their northern neighbors 2-3 in Overtime. Finland won the bronze medal match beating the biggest surprise of the tournament, Team Slovakia 5-3, thanks 4 goals in a heartbreaking third period for the Slovaks.

 

The Olympic tournament was played in a fantastic atmosphere

 

For the first time each match had to have a winner and thus was used the new point system in the preliminary round.

 

The United States dominated the Group A topping the pool undefeated, even ahead of Canada which lost 4 points in the group after a win 3-2 only after Penalty Shootouts over the dangerous Swiss, and a lose in a prestigious USA-Canada match 5-3. The Canadians had to play the Round of 16 like 3rd Switzerland with 3 points and 4th Norway with 1 single point thanks a 4-5 Overtime lose to Switzerland as well.

 

The Group B introduced some highly memorable games and a very strong and close group. Russia despite shocking lose to the Slovaks 1-2 in Penalty Shootouts decided by one of the most memorable and epic shootout goal scored by the local Vancouver Canucks star Pavol Demitra, topped the group winning both remaining matches with 7 points ahead of the Czech Republic with 6 points, Slovakia was third just behind with 5 points, Latvia unlucky to be put in this group finished 4th pointless.

 

It was the Group C that included the two direct quarterfinalists, it was just as expected the two Nordic powerhouses. Sweden the reigning champion showed their power and ambitions winning the group without losing a single point, Finland with 6 points and better overall Goal average than the Czechs advanced to the QF, 3rd Belarus with 3 points and 4th Germany 0 points moved to the Round of 16.

 

In this KO format, the all favorised countries won their games, but three of them had to work a bit harder to make the quarterfinals though, just like Slovakia had a lot of troubles to beat the brave and valiant Norwegians 4-3, Also the Czechs fought hard to eliminate Latvia 3-2 after Overtime and Switzerland 4-3 after the Penalty Shootouts session the Belarussians, only the host Canada outclassed their opponent easily 8-2 over Germany.

 

In the Quarterfinals, there were 2 big shocks that happened:

The reigning champions surprisingly finished their tournament, in a great match of such historic value for Slovakia and Slovak sport the central europeans shockingly send out the Swedes 4-3, the other big highlight of the QF stage was definitely the Russia vs Canada clash, everyone who expected a huge hockey thriller couldn´t believed what happened in that game, Canada eliminated the team around Alexander Ovechkin 7-3 !!! The other two semifinalists became Finland defeating Czech Republic 2-0 and the still unbeaten United States beating Switzerland by the same result.

 

USA started the semifinals in a incredible way outclassing Finland 6-1 including the worst historic Finlands first period finished by a 6-0 for the U.S.

In the second semifinal, it was expected that Canada will have no big troubles to bomb out Slovakia. Canada was even leading 3-0 some 5 minutes to go, but then started a unprecedented offensive show of the Slovaks closing the home team in their defensive zone, Pavol Demitra was close few seconds before the end to tie the score, but sadly for Slovakia denying by a memorable save from another local star Roberto Luongo.

 

Slovakia thanks their performances and very attractive style of play won the hearts of the Canadian fans, All cheered to the guys from under the Tatras to win this unbelievable bronze in the 3rd place match with Finland, Pavol Demitra, Marián Hossa and Marián Gáborík put a 3-1 lead after 40 minutes, Slovakia was 15 minutes of the enormous upset, but failed, Finland showing their best period of the tournament scored 4 pucks in the net of Jaroslav Halák to overturn the result 5-3 and win the bronze for the "Suomis" led by legendary Teemu Selanne (who became the all-time scorer leader with 37 points from all his 5 Olympics), Jere Lehtinen and Saku Koivu.

Slovakia finished 4th, the best ever result at the Olympics for the country, but the pain was huge after that missing chance. Pavol Demitra a Slovak Hockey legend who perrished next year in the KHL Lokomotiv Yaroslavl air crash tragedy became the only non CAN or USA player to be rewarded i the All Stars team of the tournament, he was also the best scorer of the tournament a statistic who won by scoring 10 points in the tourney just ahead of another Slovak player, Marián Hossa with 9 points (3+6)

 

 

 

One of the biggest surprises and fairy tales of the tournament had a sad end,

Slovakia,

missed a huge medal chance losing the Bronze Medal Game to Finland 3-5, after the team was leading 3-1 at the start of the third period

 

The Gold Medal match was once again at the North American soil a North American derby, Host Canada faced unbeaten and in big shape playing team USA, and it was a fantastic final, 60 minutes was not enough to determine the winner. Canada was 2-0 leading after goals of Correy Perry and Jonathan Toews, but the USA tied the score thanks Ryan Kessler and 30 seconds before the final buzz Zach Parise.

In time 67:30 Came the moment of glory, for many, the best ice hockey player of our ages, Sidney Crosby showed his geniality and extreme skills scoring the winning golden goal.

 

Sidney Crosby just scored the Overtime Gold winning goal

 

 

Slovakia arrived to this tournament with the strongest possible team our country had in all history, the Golden era team was expected to play its last tournament in this composition.

..And dear god, what a ride it was...

The start wasn´t very successful, a derby with the Czech Republic, a team we definitely don´t know how to beat at the Olympics, we lost again 1-3. but in the next match came our first win, and a absolutely unexpected over one the biggest favorites, the super team of Russia, 2-1 after Penalty Shootouts. In the last match we defeated Latvia clearly 6-0, finishing the group on 3rd place with 5 points.

In Round of 16 we got Norway, and the proof that the Knockout phase is just another tournament was clear. Slovakia had to fight really hard to beat their opponent 4-3, saved by a goal of Miroslav Šatan.

but The biggest moment of this team had only to arrive, the quarterfinal against reigning champions of Sweden, one of the biggest favorites was shockingly send home losing to Slovakia 3-4, the hero of the day was Tomáš Kopecký scoring the winning goal. but this was a great match of the first line Hossa-Demitra-Gáborík..

In the first ever Slovak Olympic semifinal we had the home team, Canada in a fantastic atmosphere had to show all their art to survive and defeat Slovakia 3-2.

The Bronze Medal Game, will be remembered as one of the saddest days in our sport, we was 15 minutes of the bronze, leading 3-1 but the last minutes of the game was epic from the Finland´s team who won the bronze 5-3.

 

 

 

 

 

Final Ranking of the Men´s Tournament:

1. Canada 

2. United States 

3. Finland 

4. Slovakia

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Sweden

6. Russia

7. Czech Republic

8. Switzerland

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

9. Belarus

10. Norway

11. Germany

12. Latvia

 

 

 

Canaada,

2010 Womens Olympic Champions,

earn 3rd consecutieve gold

 

 

 

The 2010 Women´s Olympic tournament was played with 8 teams, divided into two preliminary groups. The top 2 teams from both pools advanced to the semifinals, the remaining teams continued in the consolation round.

 

Canada won 3rd consecutive gold, USA took silver and Finland grab their first ever womens Olympic ice hockey bronze, The reigning silver medalists, Sweden finished this time outside of the medals in 4th place.  2 Goals of Marie-Philipe Poulin in the final match brought the gold for the host country.

 

Slovakia qualified to this Olympic tournament for the first time ever. Undefeated during the whole qualification (Including the World Record win 82-0 against Bulgaria) surprisingly managed to earn the Olympic quota.

 

But in the Olympic tournament it was as expected a absolutely different story, the differences in the womens world hockey were too important, it was evident already in the opening match and another historic highest result in the womens Olympic tournament this time against us, we lost to Canada 0-18.

After the reigning champions we had to face another finalist of the last tournament in the next match, and this time it was much better, losing to Sweden after a good game 2-6. After the lose 2-5 to Switzerland in the last groups match we finished as expected last and pointless.

In the consolation round came another two loses, first in the 5-8th places semifinals to Russia 2-4 and in our best match of the tournament in the 7th place game to China 1-3.

 

 

Slovakia qualified for the first and only time to the womens Ice Hockey Olympic tournament,

despite finishing last 8th without single win and with a negative record of highest lose in the history of the womens Olympic tournaments 0-18 to Canada,

it was a enormous experience for the girls

 

 

 

Final Ranking of the Women´s Tournament:

1. Canada   

2. United States     

3. Finland   

4. Sweden

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

5. Switzerland

6. Russia

7. China

8. Slovakia

 

 

Canada - USA final Highlights

Spoiler

 

 

Team Canada's Journey To Ice Hockey Gold - Vancouver 2010 Olympics

Spoiler

 

 

Highlights of Slovak matches

Spoiler

 

 

[hckošice 14,836]

Ice Hockey Tournaments at Sochi 2014

Canada went undefeated throughout the whole tournament to become

2014 Olympic Champions,

winning 9th Olympic title, and retaining the title from the Vancouver games 4 years ago

 

 

The Ice Hockey tournaments at the 2014 took place in Sochi, Russia, from 8th to 23rd February 2014. The matches were played at the Bolshoy Ice Dome and at the Shaiba Arena, both located in Sochi.

 

The format of the mens tournament was exactly the same as in Vancouver 4 years ago. 12 participating countries were divided into 3 four teams groups, after a classical single round-robins the group winners and the best 2nd ranked team received a automatic bye to the quarterfinals, all remaining teams were forced to play a play-off direct qualification match to qualify for the final 8.

 

In women´s tournament the 8 participating countries were according their world ranking positions directly seeded in the two preliminary groups, the best 4 nations in group A and remaining teams in the group B. The first two teams from group A received the direct bye for the semifinals, while the other two teams from this group and best 2 teams from group B played a play-off quarterfinal match.

 

Canada went undefeated throughout the whole mens and womens tournaments to win both golds and retain their Olympic titles.

 

The mens tournament was the 5th consecutive tourney played also with NHL players, as the North American prestigious league scheduled a break during the games, allowing their players to play once again under the 5 rings.

 

Canada became Olympic champion for the 9th time, and became the first nation since the former USSR to retain a Olympic title, they became also the first team to win all their matches since the Sarajevo 1984 triumph of the ex-USSR. Sweden won silver and Finland retained their bronze medals from Vancouver, this time beating the United States in the Bronze medal bout.

 

The 4 directly qualified teams for the quarterfinals were USA, Canada, Sweden and best 2nd team Finland from Group B.

 

The United States won the group A with 8 points ahead of the strongly motivated host team trying to finally win the first ever Russian´s Federation Olympic Ice Hockey gold. their respective match was one of the highlights of the games that finished after 8 shootouts penalty series, the man of the game was definitely TJ Oshie who scored 4 goals during this shootout session. The Russians with 6 points finished second and had to play the round of 16 just like 3rd Slovenia, The debuting country experienced a fantastic tournament that ended in a surprising quarterfinal appearance. Slovenia earned it´s first historic win at the Olympic games in the group against Slovakia, which in opposite, experienced a strongly disappointing and catastrophic tournament.

 

Canada dominated the Group B with 8 points losing only 1 single point after a Overtime win against Finland, this result in final helped also the Suomis to qualify directly for the quarterfinals as the best second ranked team. Austria with 3 points and Norway pointless went to the round of 16.

 

In the group C it was a Swedes ride, The Tre Kronor won all 3 matches to earn the first place of the group with 9 points ahead of Switzerland 6 points, Czech Republic 3 points and Latvia without any single point from this group.

Interesting was the final goal average of the Swiss after all their matches in the group : 2-1. In fact all their matches ended 1-0. Also the only goal of their opening match against Latvia 1-0 was scored at time 59:52 !!!

 

In the round of 16, Slovenia continued its heroic and historic achievement defeating their neighbors from Austria clearly 4-0. The host Russia won by the same score over Norway and the biggest surprise happened in the replay of the game Switzerland - Latvia, Latvia also reached their historic result at the Olympics beating Switzerland 3-1 to advance for the top 8. In the last match Czech Republic played the traditional derby against the Slovaks. and as every olympic confrontation between the two nations before ended by the win of the Czechs, this time 5-3.

 

Canada experienced some hard times in the quarterfinal against Latvia, a fantastic 55 saves of Gudlevskis in Latvian net started to really frustrate the Canadian super stars, but the top favorite finally found the way to score and won 2-1. their semifinals opponent became the United States after their win 5-2 over the Czechs. the second semifinal pair was Sweden vs Finland. the Swedes ended the beautiful and highly valuable fairy tale of the Slovenians 5-0 and Finland eliminated Russia 3-1. The Russians NHL top stars failed for the second consecutive time in the Quarterfinals.

 

Cursed ?

Russia with a squad fulled by NHL mega stars was aspiring to finally win this dreamed first gold since the collapse of the USSR, and when is the best occasion to do that than at home ice,

but once again they failed in the quarterfinals, this time to Finland

 

Canada - USA and Sweden - Finland. two great semifinals were expected and they delivered. it was one great night of hockey. The Swedes and the Canadians were finally the luckiest after beating their opponents 2-1 and 1-0 respectively.

 

Finland retained the bronze, this time easily beating a demotivated team USA 5-0. In this match Teemu Selänne continued to write his name to the eternal history of this sport. at his 6th Olympics at age 43 years and 234 days, became the oldest ice hockey player to win an Olympic medal, by being part of Team Finland's bronze. He also holds the Olympic record for total ice hockey points, upping it to 43 !!!

 

The Gold medal match was a battle between the reigning 2010 champions Canada and the 2006 champions Sweden. Canada confirmed its supremacy in this tournament winning 3-0 after goals of Toews, Crosby and Kunitz. Canada conceded in this tournament all in all only 3 goals ! but scored only 17 which is the smallest amount among all Olympic champions in history. Carey Price finished the tournament with 2 shutouts in the semifinal and finals.

 

Canada defeated Sweden 3-0 in the Gold Medal match,

confirming its supremacy in the tournament allowing all opponents to score only 3 goals,

both semifinals and finals ended with a shutout wins 1-0 and 3-0

 

Slovakia entered the tournament with big hopes and...too much unrealistic expectations, despite the team was almost the same as the 4th ranked Vancouver squad (missing especially Pavol Demitra RIP) was absolutely the opposite on the ice, very poor display, many wrong solutions from the players and coaching staff ended by a disastrous and extremely frustrating tournament, for the only time in history we didn´t win any single match, earning only 1 point after the Overtime lose to the host Russia 1-0 after OT. the debacle from the United States 7-1 in the opening match was a first hint, but what followed in the next match will stay as one of the biggest failure and nightmares of our hockey, the first ever historic lose to Slovenia at any level 1-3 came after one horrible and extremely below average level performance from our team.

With 1 single point we went to the round of 16 with small ambitions, and they happened to be definitely over when we realized that our opponent will be the Czech team. the first 2 periods continued in the way we played this tourney, but only at 4-0 for the czechs, we suddenly revived and started to play our best hockey in the whole tournament, unfortunately we did not had the time to do more only reducing the Czechs lead to 4-3, a empty-netter in the final minute definitely closed our bad tournament with 5-3 loss to our Czech brothers. and for such team a humiliating 11th place.

 

The biggest surprise of the tournament was definitely Slovenia,

the underestimated debuting country managed to reach the Quarterfinals to finish in a fantastic 7th place,

their first hiśtoric win came in the preliminary round after a upset over Slovakia,

which in opposite experienced a disastrous tournament full of real hockey nightmares

 

 

 

Final Ranking of the Men´s Tournament:

1. Canada 

2. Sweden 

3. Finland 

4. United States

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5. Russia

6. Czech Republic

7. Slovenia

8. Latvia

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9. Switzerland

10. Austria

11. Slovakia

12. Norway

 

 

4th Consecutive Gold for Canadian womens team,

came after a huge hockey thriller in a First ever womens hockey final decided in a Overtime

 

 

Canada dominated also the women´s tournament. Winning all 5 matches. to grab the 4th consecutive Olympic gold, repeating the achievement of their males colleagues 1920-1932 and the Soviet Unions streak 1964-1976.

 

Hayley Wickenheiser led again the team to win her 5th Olympic medal and 4th gold, for the first time a Olympic final had to be decided by Overtime. Canada won 3-2 and scored the Gold medal goal at 68:10 by Marie Philipe Poulin, who also tied the score in the Regulation time 58 seconds to go to 2-2. USA once again had to submit and took the silver medals.

 

Switzerland produced a improbable upset to won the Bronze medal match, beating Sweden 4-3 and scoring all 4 goals in the last period. This was the first ever Swiss womens Ice Hockey medal and first country´s Olympic Ice Hockey medal after 66 years.

 

The host team finished the tournament outside of medals at 6th place, but later was completely disqualified.

 

 

Final Ranking of the Women´s Tournament:

1. Canada   

2. United States     

3. Switzerland     

4. Sweden

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5. Finland

6. Germany

7. Japan

Russia - Disqualified

 

 

Canada - Sweden Mens Final highlights

Spoiler

 

 

Canada - USA womens final Highlights

Spoiler

 

[rybak 3,218]

So, here we are!!!  Finally end of too long waiting  With 12 hours and 48 minutes left to opening ceremony

 

Edited February 8, 2018 by rybak

[Ros 239]

11 hours left