{"id":462262,"date":"2026-02-18T17:35:23","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T17:35:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/462262\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T17:35:23","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T17:35:23","slug":"olympics-updates-hockeys-heating-up-plus-mikaela-shiffrins-gold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/462262\/","title":{"rendered":"Olympics updates: Hockey\u2019s heating up. Plus: Mikaela Shiffrin\u2019s gold"},"content":{"rendered":"

Games Briefing \ud83c\udfc5 | This is The Athletic\u2019s daily newsletter for the Milan Cortina Olympics. Sign up here<\/a> to receive the Games Briefing directly in your inbox.<\/p>\n

MILAN \u2014\u00a0Buonasera\u00a0from Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena, where I\u2019m sitting among a crew of nine\u00a0Athletic\u00a0journalists watching a consequential quarterfinal round in the men\u2019s hockey tournament. Will\u00a0the Canadians<\/a>\u00a0and the Americans\u00a0advance to the semifinals<\/a>? We know\u00a0Slovakia is through<\/a>, and we\u2019ll see about the others by the end of tonight.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what else we\u2019re covering:<\/p>\n

\ud83e\udd47 Mikaela Shiffrin\u2019s\u00a0gold<\/a><\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfd2 Hilary Knight\u2019s\u00a0farewell<\/a><\/p>\n

\ud83c\udf10 Sololympians<\/p>\n

To stay on top of everything throughout Italy, \ud83d\udcf2\u00a0stick with our ongoing live coverage<\/a>\u00a0and \ud83d\udcc5\u00a0customize your schedule<\/a>\u00a0by day and by sport, tailored to your time zone.<\/p>\n

Challengers: U.S. vs. Sweden quarterfinals<\/p>\n

Yep, and it\u2019s highly difficult for both of them but a highly entertaining prospect for us fans. Both of these teams have serious aspirations for gold, and their matchup at this point in the tournament feels like a gold-worthy game rather than a mid-tournament eliminator.<\/p>\n

Still, think of it like a great Elite Eight matchup in an NCAA Tournament, the kind that justifies labeling that portion of the bracket as the group of death or some other hard mode nickname.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Wednesday) could be our last day,\u201d\u00a0U.S. defenseman Quinn Hughes said.\u00a0\u201cSo we\u2019ve got to be prepared.\u00a0Playing a really good team.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s\u00a0how our forecast<\/a>\u00a0sees the full field following Slovakia\u2019s win over Germany, but before Canada and the Czech Republic took the ice (the times shown below are local \ud83c\uddee\ud83c\uddf9, Canada-Czech Republic is currently underway):<\/p>\n

\"\"\/<\/p>\n

Follow our live coverage of Canada-Czech Republic\u00a0here<\/a>, and U.S.-Sweden\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And here\u2019s\u00a0how to watch<\/a>\u00a0the USA-Sweden game, and we do recommend you watch just because plans have often not gone as expected all around these Olympics.<\/p>\n

Around the Games<\/p>\n

\u26f7\ufe0f Today was enormous for\u00a0Mikaela Shiffrin,\u00a0the skiing great who simply has not had good Olympic results lately. She had two nearly flawless runs\u00a0to win the slalom gold<\/a>, and her first run was so ridiculous that it probably would have been apt to just award her the medal then and there \u2014 she was nearly a second up on the rest of the field.<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfd2 American\u00a0Hilary Knight\u00a0is in her fifth and final Olympics. Which means that the U.S.-Canada women\u2019s hockey final is going to be her last game. That has her teammates and others\u00a0reflecting on her importance<\/a>\u00a0in the sport:\u00a0\u201cWomen\u2019s hockey is where it\u2019s at because of her.\u00a0To be able to end with a gold medal for her, I think that\u2019s the legacy we all want to leave for her,\u201d American forward Hayley Scamurra said.<\/p>\n

1\ufe0f\u20e3 What do Bolivia, Nigeria and Venezuela have in common?\u00a0They are each represented by one athlete<\/a>\u00a0at these Winter Olympics. And they say\u00a0there\u2019s a special bond that happens among athletes from countries with small delegations.<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udff3\ufe0f Should\u00a0Eileen Gu\u00a0compete for\u00a0China\u00a0or the\u00a0United States?\u00a0JD Vance, the American vice president who was here for the first few days of the Games, says\u00a0she fits the qualities of someone who should compete for Team USA<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udde8\ud83c\uddf3 China is\u00a0on the board with gold,\u00a0in snowboard slopestyle.\u00a0Congrats, Su Yiming<\/a>. And\u00a0Xu Mengtao quickly followed<\/a>\u00a0in aerials.<\/p>\n

\ud83e\udde0 A social psychologist who studies the psychology of performing under pressure tells us that at times,\u00a0the human nervous system confronts challenges<\/a>\u00a0it was never designed to face. She uses that to help explain\u00a0the science of what Olympic athletes, like Ilia Malinin, are facing.<\/p>\n

\ud83e\udd0f The New York Times looks at what happens\u00a0when competitions are so, so close<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Reminder: All of The\u00a0Athletic\u2019s\u00a0Olympics coverage is\u00a0free to read\u00a0in our app<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcf8 On the Scene\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Zack Pierce \/ The Athletic<\/p>\n

The calm after the storm\u00a0\u2014 aka, Shiffrin\u2019s gold-medal moment \u2014\u00a0at Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre in\u00a0Cortina d\u2019Ampezzo, Italy.<\/p>\n

Planning Ahead: What to watch Thursday<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcfa\u00a0\u00a0There will be seven gold medals in play Thursday. Here are some of them:<\/p>\n

Ski mountaineering, men\u2019s and women\u2019s sprint
\nIce hockey,\u00a0women\u2019s bronze (Switzerland-Sweden) and gold (U.S.-Canada)
\nSpeedskating,\u00a0men\u2019s 1,500-meter race
\nFigure skating,\u00a0women\u2019s free skate<\/p>\n

\u00a0And here\u2019s a peek at the\u00a0medal race<\/a>\u00a0with 87 events down and 29 remaining:<\/p>\n

\"\"\/<\/p>\n

Thank you for reading and following our coverage. You can reach us at\u00a0ogarcia@theathletic.com<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0zpierce@theathletic.com<\/a>\u00a0with any questions or feedback.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udceb Enjoy The Athletic\u2019s daily Olympics updates?\u00a0Check out our other newsletters, too<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Games Briefing \ud83c\udfc5 | This is The Athletic\u2019s daily newsletter for the Milan Cortina Olympics. Sign up here…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":462263,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[377],"tags":[5,2602],"class_list":{"0":"post-462262","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-hockey","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-olympics"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116092847382514309","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=462262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462262\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/462263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=462262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=462262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=462262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}