The women’s hockey tournament is four days and 19 games old and a lot happened today. Let’s dig into what surprised us, what stood out and what you need to know about what has happened so far.
10 February 2026
Sweden vs. Japan: 4-0 Sweden
Nicole: Sweden put together a really solid and successful run through their opening round and for their reward, they’ll have to beat either Czechia or Canada to make it to the medal rounds. I feel like we’ve said as much as we can say about them for now. We went in thinking there was a gap between them and the rest of Group B and they’ve proved that right. You’ve pointed out how smooth their play has been. It sure feels like they’ve done everything in their power to be as prepared as possible.
Kirsten: I wish we could’ve seen them against Switzerland in this tournament. They played a tune-up game last week that the Swiss won 4-2, but with a bit of momentum behind both teams, I think I would’ve really enjoyed seeing that offence vs. defence battle on the Olympic stage.
Nicole: Japan’s tournament ends here and it was pretty forgettable for them. Miyuu Masuhara struggled in net the rest of the tournament and did not get the start here. They seemed to run out of stamina and their inability to really find space in front of or near the net meant they struggled to score. It feels like they’ve been a little stagnant over the past few years and as we see how teams can move themselves forward over the course of a year or two, they probably need to be pressed on what they’re doing to keep up and further development
Kirsten: Although this is Japan’s worst Olympic result in a very long time, I don’t think it was overall a regression. The game against Germany, in particular, will sting, as well as the narrow loss to Italy, but overall the result, in my view, says more about the competitiveness of this tournament’s Group B than it does about Japan. There wasn’t a single game where they seemed to hit a wall – they always put up a fight to the end – but there were lapses here and there in every match that cost them heavily. I’ll be very interested to see how they regroup at Worlds this fall.
Italy vs. Germany: 2-1 Germany
Kirsten: This was a pretty evenly-matched game, but also felt incredibly representative of Group B. There were some excellent plays, great saves, and back-and-forth action, but there were also some moments that felt sloppy and haphazard, and dangerous collisions that looked more unaware than intentional. Overall it was a fun one to watch, but I’m not sure either team showed its best in preparation for the quarterfinals.
Nicole: I hadn’t put it together in these words, but you nailed it. Basically this was only a close game because neither team had the ability to separate themselves and put it away. It felt like both teams were really feeling the effects of a fourth game in six days and that led to it being even more physical than it might already have been as both teams used hands and sticks to try and stop their opponents when their slow feet prevented them from keeping up.
Kirsten: Laura Kluge was a real star for Germany. She did the work to set up the Germans’ first goal, which tied the game around the halfway mark, then secured the regulation win with a goal of her own with just 89 seconds remaining.
The Italians had Gabriella Durante in net in place of regular starter Martina Fedel, and it was nice to see her perform well in a full game after coming in in relief against Sweden.
I don’t think either of these teams have a real chance of pulling off an upset in the knockout round, but they were both very invested in this last group stage game and the battle for the seventh seed. Italy’s run, in particular, has been a lot of fun, and they’ve achieved exactly what they set out to do here in Milan. I hope they’ll enjoy strong support from the home crowd when they take on the Group A winner next game.
Nicole: I didn’t really have high hopes for anyone other than Sweden coming out of Group B to make an impact, but the sloppy bits of this game really reinforced how unlikely that is. Both of these teams would likely need several goals to pull off an upset and that they were so difficult to come by here does not bode well.
The takeaway for me here is that I hope Italy has set a new standard for what can and should be expected of a host nation team who is playing well above their ranking. It’s a bit like how I feel like Czechia has created a blueprint for how non-North American teams can go about building a team that can contend for medals regularly. Italy created a blueprint for how to build a team that combines experience and youth. This Italian team did a great job here in Milan, but they also set things up for the program to continue to grow and develop. This isn’t the last we’ll have heard of players like Matilde Fantin and Anna Caumo playing for Italy.
USA vs. Canada: 5-0 USA
Nicole: When I asked you if we should talk about this game I kind of thought you might tell me to take a long walk off a short pier. After a whole lot of sound bites and talking points about how the Rivalry Series wasn’t an accurate look at how these teams match up, this game actually looked a whole lot like those games with Canada looking really flat on offense and passive on defense. While I think there has to be some conversation about the lack of scoring against their rivals over the past year, I feel like it’s probably more concerning how easily the Americans moved around the zone, went seemingly uncontested as they crashed the net and held possession for long stretches.
What do you make of what happened today?
Kirsten: I’m actually only here for Team Italy. You never know what can happen in the knockout rounds! Forza Azzurre?
In all seriousness, I had said at the end of yesterday’s conversation that the biggest takeaway would be whether this game looked more like the Rivalry Series or Worlds and, well, we got our answer. I’m not really sure what to make of it, honestly. Team USA looked great, but they’ve looked pretty similar for years. The difference this season seems to primarily be that Canada does not look good. Usually with this kind of repeated performance I’d be inclined to call it a systems issue, but there’s a lot to be said about the execution here. A team with 16 Olympic veterans shouldn’t be offside on what felt like every other attempted zone entry, especially when several of those entries weren’t heavily contested.
After the game against Switzerland, I noted that Canada was taking a large volume of low-danger shots rather than waiting for, or making, a better opportunity, and that they were shooting a lot from the outside, leading to blocks and misses that landed on Swiss sticks. I was cautiously optimistic when the Canadians scored five against Czechia, but all of the concerns I saw against the Swiss were magnified when playing Team USA.
There was a brief segment toward the end of the second period where the Canadians really battled hard and were able to sustain some pressure, but they still stuck mostly to the outside. Otherwise, their tactics seemed to involve an awful lot of dumping the puck in, heading for the bench, and hoping for the best.
Nicole: On the other side, this was absolutely the game the Americans wanted to play. They were aggressive and fast and moved the puck seemingly at will. They hit the post three times in addition to the goals they did score and chased Ann-Renée Desbiens from the game with about 10 minutes left to play. On defense, they held Canada to four shots in the first and six in the second. KK Harvey had her second-straight three-point game with a goal and two assists. I’ve said all along that I didn’t feel like it was fair to call this group of collegians young or inexperienced and they’ve really been impressive so far in this tournament. They’ve accounted for 24 of the US’ 52 points so far, including seven of their 20 goals.
I’ve been pretty impressed with Laila Edwards’ play so far. I don’t like the move to defense but I also long ago accepted that this is the choice that was made and nothing was going to change it. That being said, Laila has been a little too casual at times as a defender and even into the recent Rivalry Series games she didn’t seem to be comfortable with where to find the line between being offensive and being a defender, so she just didn’t get involved on offense much. She’s been more of a factor thus far and doesn’t look timid or uncomfortable. She didn’t seem to get frustrated or grip her stick any tighter after hitting the post twice and the goal she scored showed off all the things to like about her game - the long reach, reading the play, knowing when to step up and an easy, confident toe drag finished with a wicked wrister.
And while she's not a collegian, I do want to point out how well Hannah Bilka is playing. She was left off the 2025 World Championship roster, in part, I heard, because her scoring numbers were down in the PWHL. I respect the kind of petty that drives you to prove folks wrong and then go score twice in this game.
Kirsten: I think we probably had a conversation at Worlds in 2023 about the U.S. strategy of integrating talented young players with the senior team early, and unsurprisingly, we’re really seeing the payout here. Hilary Knight was the star of that year’s gold medal game (in an excellent rebuttal to the strange insistence from some corners that she was “too old” and “washed up”), but the U.S. brought a lot of young players to that tournament and it seemed clear that the program was implementing a long-term plan.
Canada has historically been hesitant to bring in young players, let alone several at once in a major tournament. That seemed to be shifting slightly over the last couple of seasons, but it felt a bit like a case of too little, too late, both in terms of the number of promising young players brought into the senior team environment as well as the amount of time they got to spend within it. The U.S. collegians are indeed young, but as you said, they don’t lack experience.
On that note, one of the positives I had taken from the last couple games, which could be credited to experience, was that the Canadians didn’t panic in the face of adversity. That was less true in this game. The repeated offsides on uncontested entries, the resorting to dump-and-(don’t)-chase, the early and unthreatening shots… it all seemed to signal a team that lacked confidence and was rushing its decision-making instead of taking the time and space available (or pushing to open up more).
Nicole: I feel like I could have written a couple thousand words on this game myself. Canada’s defense looked flat and immobile in terms of an ability to start a breakout or have any sort of transition game at all. My longtime and ongoing critique of Canada has been a stubborn and unwavering adherence to whatever system or plan they have and this game highlighted some of that once again. They wanted to do their methodical slow build and pass their way out of the zone and up the ice. First of all, that’s a bad plan without Poulin. But even accepting that, the Americans brought a heavy forcecheck, which really hemmed Canada in and it sure felt like zero adjustments were made. This defensive group is not set up for quick transitions and goodness was that shown in stark relief against the play of KK Harvey in particular.
It wasn’t just that Canada was making mistakes and doing things poorly (they were) but it was happening against a background of USA doing everything they weren’t and doing it well.
Anyway, I now know why Chloe Primerano was left off this roster. Canada was not interested in her style of play, so the question now shifts to asking “why not?”
What the USA did here was not shocking in any way in that this is the roster and style of play they’ve been bringing since the 2023 World Championships and the Rivalry Series the season before that. They signaled their intention, spent the last quad preparing for it and have executed in Milan. The fact that Canada looked lost and unsure what to do about it is frankly a massive red flag.
Kirsten: Of course, before wrapping up, we should acknowledge the obvious: Marie-Philip Poulin was unavailable for this match. Maybe her presence would’ve changed the scoreline, but the game was lopsided enough from top to bottom that I’m not convinced any one player – even Poulin – could’ve single-handedly fixed Canada’s problems.
Finland vs. Switzerland: 3-1 Finland
Kirsten: My questions ahead of this match were whether Finland could finally get on the board, especially against a strong defensive side, and whether Switzerland could take control of a game. The answer for Finland was yes, and the answer for the Swiss was a decisive no. Finland took control of the game early on and though Switzerland was active in blocking shots – they got in the way of 34 in total – the Finns did perhaps the best job of any team so far in getting inside and finding dangerous shooting lanes.
Switzerland’s been having a strong tournament, but even in the game they won, it tends to feel like they’re just hanging on in their own zone and hoping that’s enough to stay in it.
Nicole: The Finns took advantage of their down time to watch tape and formulate a plan to break down the blockade Switzerland has been putting down in front of their own net. I understand Switzerland’s approach - what they’ve been doing has been very good and caused some difficulties for the biggest names in the game. If it ain’t broke … But good on Finland for taking all that information and attacking.
Looking ahead
The last group round game is the rescheduled game between Canada and Finland that is to be played Thursday, Feb. 12 at 8:30 a.m. EST.
The quarterfinal between USA and Italy has been announced for Friday, Feb. 13 at 3:10 p.m. EST.
