MILAN — The U.S. women’s hockey team came into the Milan-Cortina Winter Games ranked No. 1 in the world. And two games in group play, it’s shown that ranking might be something of an understatement.
With Saturday’s 5-0 victory over No. 3 Finland, the unbeaten Americans have outscored their two opponents 5-1 and outshot them 91-25. The goals Saturday came from Alex Carpenter, Taylor Heise, Megan Keller, Hilary Knight and Abbey Murphy. Keller and Laila Edwards each had two assists.
In goal, Aerin Frankel faced just 11 shots in posting the first shutout of the Olympic tournament.
Just as in its opening win over No. 4 Czechia, the U.S. eased its way into the game before going ahead to stay late in the first period on a power-play goal from Carpenter. The score came seven seconds after Finland’s Susanna Tapani was sent off for hooking.
The Americans doubled the advantage 2½ minutes into the second period at the end of a beautiful passing sequence that saw Britta Curl feed Murphy, whose cross-crease pass found Heise on the doorstep for the easy goal.
Sixty-six seconds later Keller’s unassisted goal made it 3-0 and the rout was on.
Next came a power-play goal from Knight, her 14th in Olympic play, equaling Natalie Darwitz and Katie King for the most in team history. Murphy closed out the scoring, banging in a rebound at the right post with less than five minutes to play.
With 10 goals, the U.S. is tied with Sweden for most in the tournament while the Americans’ goal differential of plus-nine is the best. Saturday’s win was the 11th in as many Olympic games with Finland, the bronze medalist four years ago.
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