Anders Nilsson and Sweden are heading to the gold medal game at the World Hockey Championships after handing Team USA its biggest loss of the tournament.
Sweden scored six goals in the rout, so Nilsson didn’t have to be perfect in the Swedish net. He was anyway, turning aside 41 shots for his third shutout of the tournament.
It wasn’t even a certainty that Nilsson would start this game. After he gave up two weak goals to Latvia in the quarterfinals, nearly costing Sweden the game, it would have been perfectly understandable for Sweden’s head coach, Rikard Gronborg, to turn to Magnus Hellberg against the US.
Instead, Gronborg put his trust in Nilsson and the big goaltender rewarded his faith.
Team USA is the highest-scoring team in the tournament, racking up 42 goals in the eight games heading into the semifinal. They may have padded those stats with 13 goals against Korea and nine against Norway, but even with that in mind, their high-powered offence led by Patrick Kane was going to be hard to contain.
It was Sweden, however, that couldn’t be stopped. They opened the scoring late in the first period off the rush. Keith Kinkaid couldn’t control Filip Forsberg’s long wrist shot and Jacob de la Rose shoved the rebound through Kinkaid’s legs, where it sat in the crease for Viktor Arvidsson to swipe into the net.
Adam Larsson took a double-minor for high sticking early in the second period, giving the US a chance to turn the game around. Instead, Nilsson shut the door and Sweden went the other way and scored shorthanded.
Mikael Backlund stole the puck at the blue line and took off for a partial breakaway. Kinkaid made a great pokecheck on Backlund, then somehow got his toe on Magnus Paajarvi’s follow-up attempt, but Paajarvi stuck with the play and scored on the rebound, with Kane coasting on the backcheck.
Two minutes later, Johnny Gaudreau took a two-handed chop at Hampus Lindholm behind the play, giving the dangerous Sweden power play a chance to go to work. Patric Hornqvist finished off a pretty passing play to make it 3-0.
11 seconds after that, Sweden scored again when Mattias Janmark burst past Charlie MacAvoy and slid the puck five-hole on Kinkaid.
Those three goals in three minutes essentially ended the game. The US could only hope that Nilsson fell apart and that wasn’t in the cards. Nilsson made 20 saves in the third period alone to complete the shutout.
The USA got desperate, pulling Kinkaid for the extra attacker midway through the third period, but Arvidsson simply scored into the empty net. Then Adrian Kempe added another goal on Kinkaid for good measure.
Nilsson struggled at times with his rebound control, but showed his athleticism and flexibility with several stunning saves. His first period save on Johnny Gaudreau was one of the best saves of the tournament.
Mid-2nd, leads 4-0. Nilsson has been UNREAL! #IIHFWorlds pic.twitter.com/PeHHyv9VWw
— Vancouver Canucks (@Canucks) May 19, 2018
Later in the third period, Nilsson hung on to the shutout with a near-miraculous save on defenceman Neal Pionk. Down and out during a scrum in front of the Swedish net, Nilsson somehow managed to get his glove out to backhand Pionk’s slap shot.
Now Sweden will play for gold against the winner of Canada and Switzerland in the other semifinal.
