MILAN — It was quiet back at the Olympic village Friday night. Finland had just squandered a literal golden opportunity, letting a two-goal lead slip away against mighty Canada in the semifinals, and the meeting room at the village was funereal. Opportunities such as the one the Finns had don’t come around often. If ever.
But there are other opportunities, too. And one by one, the veteran Finns stood before the gathered group and started rebuilding their self-esteem, re-energizing their spirits, re-engaging their hearts and minds for one more game in the blue and white of their native country.
Captain Mikael Granlund talked. So did defenseman Olli Määttä. So did assistant coaches Tuomo Ruutu and Ville Peltonen. Each of them had been in this exact spot — this exact headspace — before. Each of them woke up the next morning and kept fighting. Each of them went home with a medal.
“We talked about how meaningful it is that you play in the Olympics,” defenseman Niko Mikkola said. “You probably have one or two chances in your whole career. You want something to remember it (by).”
Now they have it. A 6-1 victory over upstart Slovakia that was closer than the final score suggests Saturday put the Finns where they always seem to be: on the Olympic podium. As they celebrated and hugged and discussed a momentous fortnight in Milan, several of the players noted the sheer weight of the bronze disc slung around their necks. History is always heavy.
Määttä was just 20 years old when Finland lost by a goal to archrival Sweden in the semifinals at Sochi. It tore at his soul. But that just made the 5-0 trouncing of a disinterested American squad in the bronze medal game all the sweeter. Now a wily veteran closer to the end of his career than the beginning, in perhaps his final Olympics, he wasn’t going to sit back and watch this opportunity pass him by.
Nor was he going to let his teammates.
“Everybody was a little disappointed, obviously — OK, a lot,” Määttä said. “But at the same time, the respect and appreciation for this tournament — you win a medal in the Olympics, it’s a big thing.”
Finland jumped out to a 2-0 lead on goals by Sebastian Aho and Erik Haula. This time, unlike in Friday’s semifinal against Canada, the Finns didn’t retreat into a shell. They kept attacking the Slovaks and goaltender Samuel Hlavaj, who was so good all tournament to get his team to the final four, but who looked more like a scuffling AHL goalie in the medal round. Slovak captain Tomáš Tatar gave the Slovaks life with a goal in the final minute of the second period, but Finland pulled away in the third, getting goals from Roope Hintz and Kaapo Kakko, with Joel Armia and Haula adding empty-netters.
As they received their medals, most of the Finns were straight-faced. There would be time for celebration back at the village.
Saturday night was going to be a heck of a lot more fun than Friday night was.
“Maybe a couple beers,” Mikkola said.
They earned it. They always seem to. Because all the Finns do is win medals.
This was Finland’s fifth medal in six Olympics with NHL participation — more than Canada, more than Sweden, more than the United States, more than anybody. There are 752 Canadians who have played at least 10 games in the NHL this season. There are 222 Americans. There are 83 Swedes.
There are only 39 Finns, seven of whom are goalies and only eight of whom are defensemen. Their talent pool is shallow, but their resolve and their commitment to smart, opportunistic, two-way hockey runs deep. Four bronzes and a silver in six tries, with a gold medal in Beijing, to boot.
How to explain it?
“We got sisu,” forward Artturi Lehkonen said, using a Finnish word that has no direct English translation but generally means gritty, determined, resilient, hardy.
Slovakia fell short of repeating as a bronze medal winner in the Winter Olympics. (Gregory Shamus / Getty Images)
For Slovakia, it doesn’t have the same history of Olympic success as Finland. Not even close.
The bronze medal won at the Beijing Olympics in 2022 was the country’s first in men’s ice hockey, and it had an opportunity here to do something even more meaningful, more impactful back home.
The 6-2 loss to the United States in the semifinal did not seem to sting nearly as much as this loss to Finland, with a bronze medal right there for it, especially trailing 2-1 after 40 minutes, one shot away from tying it up against a team that lost 3-2 to Canada on a last-minute power-play goal the night before.
The Slovak players were optimistic Friday night, despondent 24 hours later.
“Hockey is the No. 1 sport in Slovakia, so everyone is with us — I get 1,000 messages every day of how proud they are,” Washington Capitals defenseman Martin Fehérváry said. “I’m a little disappointed we couldn’t do more and win some medal because I remember in (2012), when the guys won a silver medal at the world championships, it was like the whole city was in the stands and they were supporting in the streets. It was unreal.
“I was looking forward to feel it on my skin as well, but we didn’t do it.”
No Slovak player felt more pressure to produce that medal, to produce that feeling on their skin, than Juraj Slafkovský, the Montreal Canadiens forward who finished his Olympics with 8 points in six games, but none in the bronze medal game Saturday.
As his former Canadiens teammate Armia lodged the puck in the empty Slovak net with 4:28 to play, making it 5-1 Finland and essentially clinching the bronze medal, Slafkovský was on the opposite side of the ice, at the offensive blue line, waiting for a pass that never came. Oliver Okuliar, a 25-year-old who plays in Sweden for Skellefteå AIK, was carrying the puck up the ice, made a move on Armia at center ice, Armia did not bite on the move, checked Okuliar off the puck and eventually iced the game.
As Slafkovský slowly skated back to his bench, he slammed his stick against the boards at a spot that happened to have the Olympic rings on it.
His Olympic dream of a medal was dead.
“The guys that are already home, they don’t have a medal. And we don’t have one either,” Slafkovský said. “It’s still the same thing. Right now, that’s how I feel. It sucks. Losing sucks.”
All of that is true. Slovakia has no medal; there will be no party in the streets of Bratislava. But Slafkovský also said finishing fourth in the tournament is the same as finishing last, and that is not true, even if he and the host Italians have the same number of medals.
Finishing fourth, beating Finland in the preliminary round, scoring in the last minute against Sweden to win the goal-differential tiebreak that allowed Slovakia to finish first in Group B, all of that counts for something for a hockey nation that is trying to ascend back into the world’s elite.
That was a laughable notion before this tournament; it is not so laughable now. And when Slovakia reaches a point where half its team is made up of NHL players, such as Switzerland or the Czech Republic, a point where a player playing professionally in Sweden is not on the ice with the puck on his stick with the goalie pulled and the team needing a goal, that will be when it is even less laughable.
But for now, considering Slovakia had only seven NHL players here, and considering it was the youngest team in the tournament, finishing fourth is still an accomplishment, perhaps one that will be looked back upon as the first step back to an Olympic podium for this proud hockey nation.
For Finland, it’s yet another podium, but it’s anything but routine. It overcame a terrible performance at the 4 Nations Face-Off last year, and a poor start to these Olympics — a 4-1 loss to these same Slovaks in the tournament opener. It overcame Sweden in the group stage, then overcame the crushing disappointment of coming so close to playing for gold. Not only that, it did it without superstar winger Mikko Rantanen, who missed the bronze medal game with a lower-body injury.
Not to mention the absence of would-be captain Aleksander Barkov, who has missed the whole NHL season with a knee injury.
It’s a remarkable accomplishment by a remarkable hockey country.
Mikkola, Anton Lundell and Eetu Luostarinen now have a bronze medal to go with the two Stanley Cup titles they’ve won in the past two seasons.
And in this case, bronze and silver are pretty much neck-and-neck.
“I’ve got to say, it (ranks) pretty high,” Lundell said. “It’s different from a Stanley Cup, being able to represent your country. It’s a different type of pride, honor, achievement. It’s something you dream (about) since you put skates on, when you watched TV when you were young. You wanted to be one of those Selannes, one of those Ruutus, one of those Koivus, playing in the Olympics. Here we are. We won a bronze medal. I’m very proud.”
