US men rout Slovakia, will play Canada for hockey gold medal

Kevin Baxter, Los Angeles Times on Feb 20, 2026

Published in Olympics

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MILAN — The U.S. and Canada faced off in the men’s and women’s hockey finals in the same Olympics twice before the Milan-Cortina Games. Both times Canada took home all the gold.

Now the Americans have a chance at a sweep of their own after the men’s team routed Slovakia, 6-2, on Friday to advance to the gold-medal game Sunday, when they will face — you guessed it — Canada. The U.S. women have already done their part, beating Canada in overtime in their final Thursday.

“They wore our colors proudly. Couldn’t be more proud of them,” Winnipeg Jets goaltender Connor Hellebuyck said of the women’s team. “Now it’s our turn.”

“Hopefully,” forward Jake Guentzel added, “we can follow what they did.”

The two U.S. teams followed different paths to their finals. The women laid waste to the competition, outscoring their opponents 31-1 in the first five games. The men also averaged a tick over five goals a game in the preliminary round plus looked a little rusty doing it.

With players on its roster from 17 NHL teams, chemistry was a work in progress for the U.S. men in the early going. That work is done now, said Minnesota Wild defenseman Quinn Hughes, who had one assist Friday and leads the team with six.

“We’re obviously better than we were the first game,” he said. “The more you play together, the more you’re going to be able to read off each other and understand the system we want to play and where [guys] like pucks and whatnot.

“If we play 20 games, we’d be better in game 20 than we are today.”

And the Americans were pretty good Friday, running out to 5-0 lead behind a pair of second-period goals from Jack Hughes and three assists from Zach Werenski. The other scores came from Dylan Larkin and Tage Thompson in the first period and another from Jack Eichel in the second.

Brady Tkachuk’s third-period breakaway goal closed out the U.S. scoring.

“We have everything,” Hellebuyck said. “We have chemistry, we have awesome [defensemen], we have awesome scorers, playmakers, penalty kill, power play. We have it all.”

They also have motivation. Not only has Canada beaten the U.S. in an Olympic final twice this century, it also beat the Americans in the final of last year’s 4 Nations Face-Off.

“If we played them in a best of seven, it probably goes seven. So it’s just going to be whoever’s better on that day,” Quinn Hughes said. “You want to go through the best. And right now that’s them after winning 4 Nations.

“[But] I think we’ve got a great opportunity to try to win gold.”

Every player on the 25-man U.S. roster plays in the NHL. Same with Canada. And Guentzel said the fact so many Canadians and Americans are teammates and opponents in the NHL adds to the rivalry.

“We play each other all year on different teams,” he said. “We’re close to each other. It’s going to be electric out there.”

The top pros were held out of the last two Winter Olympics, in 2018 over a dispute between the players and the IOC, and in 2022 because of COVID-19 interruptions in scheduling.

“Having NHL players back in the Olympics, it’s huge,” Hellebuyck said. “So many people tune in and see how how exciting the sport can be.”

While that might level the playing field a bit for the U.S., history is still on Canada’s side. Not only did it win 4 Nations, but it has won six of seven Olympic finals with the U.S., losing only in 1960. And the U.S. has never won an Olympic tournament played outside the U.S., with its two gold medals coming in Lake Placid in 1980 — do you believe in miracles? —and Squaw Valley 20 years earlier.

The experience factor also favors Canada, which won the last two tournaments featuring NHL players. Kings defenseman Drew Doughty was on both those teams.

“It means the world to me. The absolute world,” he said of the Olympic final.

“It’s gold or nothing for us. All the previous ones were tough roads. It’s the Olympics. The pressure’s there. But once you touch the ice, you’ve just got to focus on doing your job. And that’s all it is.”

The U.S. women got that job done. Now it’s the men’s turn.