Ice hockey at the 1998 Winter Olympics
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Ice hockey at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Overview
1998 was the first year that featured women in ice hockey competition. It was greatly anticipated that the women's gold medal match would feature Canada versus the United States, with Canada winning, Canada having won all the competitions in previous years in women's hockey, and the United States perpetually finishing second, with no one else up their level of play. However, the United States became the first country to win gold in women's ice hockey at the Olympics.1998 was the first year that the modern NHL took a break to allow its players to participate in the Olympics, allowing the United States and Canada to field teams with professionals of top calibre, as the European teams were doing since the IIHF first allowed professinals into the Olympics.
Both Canada and the United States were heavily favoured; they had previously faced off in the final of the 1996 World Cup of Hockey. The United States is remembered as the ugly Americans due to violence after it was downed in the quarterfinals. After a below-expectations performance in the tournament which included only one win, several American players trashed their hotel rooms (the US squad did not stay in the Olympic village), and they left without apologizing. The Canadian team, despite a strong start in the round robin, failed to play well after losing their semifinal match, and disappointed Canadians who wished for Wayne Gretzky to get an Olympic medal, playing a lacklustre bronze medal game.
Memorably, during the shootout in their semifinal match against the Czech Republic, Canadian coach Marc Crawford opted to have defenseman Ray Bourque shoot in the shootout instead of NHL all-time leading scorer Gretzky. Hockey commentators alternatively criticized Crawford's decision (Bourque, like the other four Canadian shooters, failed to score) and praised it on the grounds that Bourque was one of hockey's most accurate shooters at the time and Gretzky had always been surprisingly mediocre on breakaways. Thanks to the prowness of Dominik Hašek who was easily the best goaltender at the Olympics as well as the NHL, the Czech Republic went on to win the semi-final en route to winning the gold medal.
Japanese fans were disappointed when their adopted hero, Paul Kariya, a Canadian of Japanese heritage and one of Team Canada's best stars, failed to make the games due to a vicious crosscheck by Gary Suter during regular season NHL play. The Canadian media has accused Suter and other American players of deliberately attempting to injure Canadian players in the final NHL games leading up to the Olympics. The Japanese shifted their attentions to a Canadian player of Japanese extraction, Vicky Sunohara, and were pleased with a vicarious silver medal from Canada's women's team.
The format of the men's tournament was also criticized because the National Hockey League clubs would not release their players for the preliminary round. This severely hampered the campaigns of Germany and Slovakia, both of whom failed to qualify for the final group stage. Also the final group stage was criticized as being meaningless since all of the teams qualified for the quarter-finals.
The format was eventually changed for the 2006 tournament in an effort to address these criticisms.
Games were played at The Big Hat and Aqua Wing Arena.
Ice Hockey medal winners at the 1998 Winter Olympics:
Men
1998 was the first year that the modern NHL took a break to allow its players to participate in the Olympics, allowing the United States and Canada to field teams with professionals of top calibre, as the European teams were doing since the IIHF first allowed professionals into the Olympics.
Preliminaries
Group A
Top team (shaded) advanced to the final round.|
| Pld | W | L | T | GF | GA | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Kazakhstan | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 14 | 11 | 5 |
Slovakia | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 9 | 9 | 3 |
Italy | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 11 | 11 | 2 |
Austria | 3 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 9 | 12 | 2 |
Group B
Top team (shaded) advanced to the final round.|
| Pld | W | L | T | GF | GA | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Belarus | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 14 | 4 | 5 |
Germany | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 7 | 9 | 4 |
France | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 5 | 8 | 2 |
Japan | 3 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 10 | 1 |
Final Round
Group A
|
| Pld | W | L | T | GF | GA | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Canada | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 12 | 3 | 6 |
| Sweden | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 11 | 7 | 4 |
United States | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 8 | 10 | 2 |
Belarus | 3 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 4 | 15 | 0 |
Group B
|
| Pld | W | L | T | GF | GA | Pts | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 15 | 6 | 6 | |||||||||||
Czech Republic | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 12 | 4 | 4 | |||||||||||
Finland | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 11 | 9 | 2 | |||||||||||
Kazakhstan | 3 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 6 | 25 | 0 |
Medal Round
Quarterfinals
'''
Canada''' | 4:1 |
Kazakhstan | |||||||||||
'''
Czech Republic''' | 4:1 |
United States | |||||||||||
| Sweden | 1:2 | '''
Finland | |||||||||||
'''
| 4:1 |
Belarus |
Semifinals
Canada | 1:2 | '''
Czech Republic''' |
Finland | 4:7 |
Bronze Medal Game
'''
Finland''' | 3:2 |
Canada |
Gold Medal Game
'''
Czech Republic''' | 1:0 |
|
Leading scorers
| Rk |
| GP | G | A | Pts | PIM |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
Teemu Selänne | 5 | 4 | 6 | 10 | 8 |
| 2 |
Saku Koivu | 6 | 2 | 8 | 10 | 4 |
| 3 |
Pavel Bure | 6 | 9 | 0 | 9 | 2 |
| 4 |
Alexander Koreshkov | 7 | 3 | 6 | 9 | 2 |
| 5 |
Phillipe Bozon | 4 | 5 | 2 | 7 | 4 |
| 6 |
K. Shafranov | 7 | 4 | 3 | 7 | 6 |
| 7 |
Dominik Lavoie | 4 | 5 | 1 | 6 | 8 |
| 8 |
Jere Lehtinen | 6 | 4 | 2 | 6 | 2 |
| 9 |
Alexei Yashin | 6 | 3 | 3 | 6 | 0 |
| 10 |
Serge Poudrier | 6 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 4 |
| 11 |
Sergei Federov | 6 | 1 | 5 | 6 | 8 |
Final Rankings
1. Czech Republic2. Russia
3. Finland
4. Canada
5. Sweden
6. United States
7. Belarus
8. Kazakhstan
9. Germany
10. Slovakia
11. France
12. Italy
13. Japan
14. Austria
Women
1998 was the first time the Winter Olympics featured Women's Ice Hockey.The loss of Canada versus United States of America in the Gold Medal final, is one of the most important events in International Women's Hockey. It shows the arrival of the United States as a Tier One team. Before this, Canada was the only team to ever win major international competitions.
The games also reinforced the fact that there was only one team on the Tier Three level, Finland, which became Tier Two with the ascension of the Americans to Tier One.
1st and 2nd (Shaded Gold) Advanced to Gold Medal Game
3rd and 4th Place (Shaded Green) Advanced to Bronze Medal Game
Bronze Medal Game
Gold Medal Game
Final Rankings
External links
| Ice hockey at the Olympic Games |
| 1920 | 1924 | 1928 | 1932 | 1936 | 1948 | 1952 | 1956 | 1960 | 1964 | 1968 | 1972 | 1976 | 1980 | 1984 | 1988 | 1992 | 1994 | 1998 | 2002 | 2006 |
| at the 1998 Winter Olympics (Nagano) |
| Alpine skiing | Biathlon | Bobsleigh | Cross country skiing | Curling | Figure skating | Freestyle skiing | Ice hockey | Luge | Nordic combined | Short track speed skating | Ski jumping | Snowboarding | Speed skating | |
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