U.S. Gets The Big Chill Americans, Along With Swedes, Fail To Reach Hockey’s Medal Play

Done and gone.

The Olympic men’s hockey tournament claimed its biggest victims - the greatest U.S. team ever assembled and defending champion Sweden - before either got to play for a medal.

The Czech Republic knocked out the Americans 4-1 and Finland beat Sweden 2-1 in Wednesday’s quarterfinals.

Canada, seeking its first hockey gold medal since 1952, and Russia rolled on with 4-0 records. The Canadians swept past Kazakstan and Russia defeated Belarus by identical 4-1 scores.

Tonight’s semifinals feature Canada and the Czech Republic (3-1) in a goaltending showdown between Patrick Roy and Dominik Hasek, while Finland (2-2) faces Russia.

The Americans wound up sixth - an improvement over their worst-ever finish of eighth in 1994, yet well below expectations.

“Everyone expected to be around here for another week and all of a sudden, you’re yanked out and done,” Jamie Langenbrunner said. “Everyone’s frustrated because the last two games we played pretty well, but we didn’t win.”

The Americans had just one victory over Belarus and losses to Sweden, Canada and the Czech Republic, despite outshooting every opponent. Facing Roy and Hasek - the world’s best goalies - in consecutive games didn’t help. The U.S. scored just once against each man.

“We played real hard every night and every game,” Bill Guerin said. “Unfortunately, we didn’t get the breaks. He (Hasek) was making saves when he had to and getting lucky when he had to.”

Canada didn’t need luck or a marvelous performance by Roy against lowly Kazakstan, outscored 25-6 in losing its three round-robin games. Joe Nieuwendyk, Shayne Corson, Brendan Shanahan and Steve Yzerman scored for Canada. Wayne Gretzky added two assists.

“We knew that we were the superior team,” Gretzky said. “We just had to be patient, be smart and play our game.”

The Czechs did the same against the United States.

Hasek gave up a first-period goal to Mike Modano, then his teammates scored four straight goals to send the Americans home early.

“They didn’t play badly,” Hasek said. “When you only score one goal, you can’t win.”

Belarus found that out in its loss to Russia.

Before the former Soviet republic could score its only goal, the Russians led 4-0 on goals by Valery Kamensky, Andrei Kovalenko, Pavel Bure and Alexei Morozov.

Russia is a victory away from a berth in its first gold-medal game since 1992, when the Unified team won. The former Soviet Union dominated the Olympics with seven of eight gold medals from 1964 to 1992.

“We don’t care how we win,” Sergei Fedorov said. “We try to stick with the game plan of covering both ends of the ice. We have four lines that play different styles. That’s our secret weapon.”

The Swedes, who beat Canada in an overtime shootout for gold in 1994, stumbled in the absence of defenseman Ulf Samuelsson. He got kicked out of the Olympics for carrying both Swedish and U.S. passports, nullifying his Swedish citizenship.

“I thought before the game it didn’t matter, but everyone wasn’t really mentally prepared to play,” coach Kent Forsberg said. “Maybe they were thinking more what happened the last 24 hours.”

Teemu Selanne snapped a scoreless tie with two goals in the third period, sending Finland to a surprising semifinal berth.

The Finns lost their opener 3-0 to the Czechs and got beaten 4-3 by Russia before salvaging the No. 3 seed in round-robin play with a win over Belarus.

“We have been taking little steps, getting better all the time,” Finnish coach Hannu Aravita said. “To get to the finals we have to take one more step, and I think we are ready to do that.”

U.S. notes

Czech Republic defenseman Peter Svoboda said frustration set in early among the American shooters against goaltender Dominik Hasek.

“It’s never so easy to play against a guy like Dominik because he does frustrate you,” Svoboda said. “They had a lot of scoring chances the first five or 10 minutes. If you don’t capitalize on these chances, it’s hard on your mind. You start forcing it and you make a few turnovers, and all of a sudden, it’s in your net and you start panicking. That’s exactly what happened in this game.”

And lest you think Canada and the U.S. have a lock on the joy of victory and the agony of defeat in this tournament, think again. Surely there was sadness in Sweden, a nation that expected to defend its gold medal from the last Winter Games. But the Swedes lost in an upset to archrival Finland.

In the Czech Republic, forward Martin Straka said, there was happiness about the victory over America.

“Back home, nobody’s working. The kids are staying home from school,” he said moments after the 4-1 win over Team USA. “Everybody goes to the movie theaters to watch the games on the big screen. It’s a big thing there. I’m sure they’re celebrating now.”

Many American players immediately booked flights back home. Among the first were forwards Jamie Langenbrunner and John Leclair, both expectant fathers whose wives are overdue.

Despite the disappointment, Brett Hull would return to the Olympics in a heartbeat. Certainly, he has no regrets.

“Not one bit,” he said. “It’s great for the game, great for the league, great for everything. I still feel it would be great for the Olympics if there were all amateurs coming here. But I’d be more than happy to come again if they ask me.”