{"id":599836,"date":"2026-02-19T00:41:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T00:41:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/599836\/"},"modified":"2026-02-19T00:41:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T00:41:16","slug":"u-s-mens-hockey-outlasts-sweden-in-ot-final-four-matchups-set-for-olympic-tournament","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/599836\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. men&#8217;s hockey outlasts Sweden in OT; Final four matchups set for Olympic tournament"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>U.S. head coach Mike Sullivan told the men&#8217;s hockey team prior to the quarterfinal matchup with Sweden to consider it a &#8220;Game 7.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>However, the showdown ended up being even better than playoff hockey, as the American squad outlasted Sweden 2-1 in an overtime thriller.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcolympics.com\/results\/hockey\/men-s-tournament?eventUnitId=6b67dd75-c802-3935-a6c9-313e79c5e6b1&amp;scheduleSessionId=c6a07be0-8e80-e5cf-dcad-625378ef0a17\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>MATCH RESULTS<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcolympics.com\/videos\/dylan-larkin-gets-team-usa-board-against-sweden\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Dylan Larkin <\/strong>scored the only goal in regulation<\/a> in the second period to give the U.S. a 1-0 lead over Sweden for the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cScoring first and I thought we had the edge in shots and wearing them down,&#8221; Larkin said after the game. &#8220;But they pushed in the third (period) and got one late, but I felt we deserved to win and we did,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>It looked as if the United States would hold on to move on to the final four, but Sweden&#8217;s <strong>Mika Zibanejad <\/strong>wasn&#8217;t much for that plan.<\/p>\n<p>Zibanejad scored with just over a minute and a half to go to send the game to overtime, tied up 1-1.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;That is as nervous as I have ever been in a hockey game,&#8221; Larkin said. The way 3-on-3 goes (in overtime), it is about being opportunistic. Someone could fall, the puck could bounce, anything can happen, especially with the ice out there, he added.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcolympics.com\/videos\/team-usas-full-quarterfinal-overtime-win-over-sweden\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The three-on-three overtime period lasted under four minutes.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I calmed down a lot when I saw Quinn (HUGHES) with it and was glad we got that guy,&#8221; Larkin said.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcolympics.com\/videos\/quinn-hughes-overtime-goal-sends-team-usa-final-four\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">It was <strong>Quinn Hughes<\/strong> who found the back of the net<\/a> to keep Team USA&#8217;s medal hopes alive with a win 2-1 over Sweden. He admitted the game could have gone either way in the end.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGot lucky. Kind of got the defenders in the position that I wanted and was able to get the shot off,&#8221; Hughes said after the win. &#8220;That\u2019s (Sweden) one of the best countries in the world. They\u2019ve got superstars everywhere,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p>The United States advances to the semifinal on Feb. 20 against Slovakia.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It was a great hockey game and I could not be more proud of our guys,\u201d Sullivan said after the game. &#8220;We\u2019ll enjoy tonight and then turn our attention to Slovakia,\u201d Sullivan added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"U.S. head coach Mike Sullivan told the men&#8217;s hockey team prior to the quarterfinal matchup with Sweden to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":599837,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2],"tags":[108086,214248,51,8665,255782,49263,50,30062,188497,129,1348,52,67],"class_list":["post-599836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-dylan-larkin","tag-game-4","tag-headlines","tag-hockey","tag-mens-tournament","tag-mika-zibanejad","tag-news","tag-quarterfinals","tag-quinn-hughes","tag-sweden","tag-team-usa","tag-top-stories","tag-united-states"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116094519741626083","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=599836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/599837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}