Women’s Hockey Dominance: American Teams Reign Supreme

The Americans crushed the Canadians on Tuesday. No verb would be more accurate. A 5-0 victory for the United States, which thus won the most unequal match of the 11 between the two neighboring countries in their history at the Games. Never before has a Canada-United States Olympic duel been settled by such a large margin.

Canada head coach Troy Ryan didn’t try to sugarcoat reality.

When did he feel that this match was beyond his control? He lets out a sigh. “Pretty early.” The tempo was faster than for our first two matches,” he noted, in the corridors of the Santagiulia arena.

Aspects to correct? He offered a brutally honest response. “It can be difficult from a coaching point of view because there are so many areas to improve, you have to stick to a few and work on them. »

In fact, the only encouraging element for his team that he had to offer was his update on the health of Marie-Philip Poulin. He said he was “optimistic” that his captain would return to action during the tournament. “Maybe not against Finland [jeudi]. But the medical team members were very optimistic in my short conversation with them. »

The problem was that the Canadians were not one player away, no matter how good she was, from being competitive.

Superior everywhere

The Americans arrived in Milan with six players 1.80 m (5 feet 11 inches) or taller compared to none for Canada. This difference was already obvious just by watching the two teams go since the start of the tournament. The contrast was even more striking now that they were facing each other.

“They are big, strong, fast,” Ryan said. It will never be easy to win inside against teams like that, but you have to find ways. Sometimes you won’t be able to, but you can cause a penalty by forcing them to stretch. But if, because it’s hard, you don’t go, you’re falling into their game.”

It wasn’t just a question of size either. Speed also has something to do with it, in this tournament where the Americans are much younger (26 years old on average) than their rivals (29 years old). Take the second goal. Caroline Harvey takes off like an arrow as soon as she steals the puck from Sarah Nurse on American territory. She clears in the corner, where Abbey Murphy wins the race, before giving the puck to Hannah Bilka, left unsupervised.

Murphy, a 5-foot-5 ball of energy, has shown that she can have a great career in the LPHF when she leaves the University of Minnesota in the spring. She obtained three assists and caused four penalties for the Canadians, always involved in the game.

“Very few players can play this role of agitator, while having talent, dynamism,” recognized Troy Ryan.

When it wasn’t the Americans causing chaos, the Canadians were doing them a favor. Take this sequence midway through the game, during a power play, when Canada attacks 3-on-2 after a missed scoring chance by the United States. Natalie Spooner, the disc carrier, changes her trajectory when arriving at the blue line, and causes an offside.

In his post-match observations, Ryan will identify the number of offsides and disallowed clearances as moments where his team did not exude confidence. “I’m not saying it was a trust issue, but it gave that impression,” he said.

Offensively, the chances were rare, as evidenced by the Americans’ 33-20 domination on shots. There was neither quantity nor quality. “All our shots were coming from the periphery, with no return,” lamented Ryan.

Heavy history

Casually, this is Canada’s seventh straight defeat against the United States. This stretch includes two games at the 2025 World Championship and all four games in the Rivalry Series last fall.

The match scores, however, signal a worrying trend for Canada. The defeats of the 2025 World Championship were recorded by one goal. Those of the Rivalry Series, by three, five, six and three goals. And now, this dry defeat by a quintet of goals, for an aggregate score of 35-11 in the seven losses.

The players did not seem at all alarmed. “They are fast and robust. We are too, but it was not in our favor tonight,” said Kristin O’Neill.

“When we look at the overall picture, it remains a preliminary round match,” added goalkeeper Ann-Renée Desbiens, removed from the match after the fifth goal. The champion team will be the one who wins all three matches from the quarter-finals onwards. That’s the beauty of hockey, you start from scratch every time the puck drops. »

Seeing how this tournament is going so far, it’s hard not to imagine the Americans with one foot on the top step of the podium already. A danger that John Wroblewski sees coming, the Ken-like man who leads the American team.

“What is the hardest part of climbing a mountain? asked the coach. Go home. You can be satisfied with having climbed Mount Everest, but the return will be more difficult. If you think you’ve accomplished something, that’s when the mountain will devour you. »