Belarus stuns Sweden in Olympic upset for the ages

Originally published on IIHF.com in 2002

By Lucas Aykroyd

In one of the most stunning upsets in Olympic hockey history, Belarus defeated Sweden 4-3 Wednesday in quarter-finals action.

Vladimir Kopat scored the winner on a freaky shot with 2:24 remaining in the third period. Coming down the right wing, the Belarus forward slapped a high shot from between the red line and blue line toward Swedish goalie Tommy Salo, who didn’t know how to handle it.

The puck hit Salo in the mask area, bounced over his head and trickled over the goal line.

It was Kopat’s first tally of the tournament. The E Center crowd burst into an ecstasy for the underdog Belorussians, who warded off Sweden’s final desperate rally to claim victory.

Oleg Romanov, Dmitri Dudik and Andrei Kovalev scored Belarus’s other goals. Nicklas Lidström, Michael Nylander and Mats Sundin tallied for Sweden, which had gone a perfect 3-0 in the Final Round with convincing wins over Canada, the Czech Republic and Germany. Belarus was 0-3 with 22 goals allowed in losses to Russia, Finland and the USA.

This compares to the greatest Swedish defeat ever at the Olympics. Sweden lost 3-2 to Japan in soccer at the 1936 Summer Games. In Sweden, this will now become known as “another Japan.” And in fifty years, they’ll refer to a “Belarus.”

“Tonight we didn’t have a good game,” said Sundin. “That’s a team we should beat every time we play.”

To the world at large, the only hockey parallels would be the USA’s 1980 “Miracle on Ice” victory over the Soviets and Great Britain’s 1936 gold medal victory over Canada by a 2-1 score.

“This kind of game happened before, in 1980, and it’s going to happen again,” said Swedish Head Coach Hardy Nilsson, disappointed in defeat. “Belarus played very well and they have a goalie who probably played the game of his life.”

Belarus goaltender Andrei Mezin stopped 44 of 47 shots he faced for the victory. Compared to his early tournament form, Salo had a major letdown with only 15 saves on 19 shots.

“I feel bad for Team Sweden,” said Mezin. “I really like them. I expected them to go to the final or the top four. For sure it’s a miracle for us.”

Clearly Belarus is inebriated with joy. Mezin joked that all the celebratory vodka in Minsk would be gone by now, while Head Coach Vladimir Krikunov said he had lost a bottle of cognac in a bet over the result of today’s game.

“Sometimes even a gun without a bullet shoots, and that was us today,” Mezin exulted. “They weren’t hungry for the goals. I think we beat them mentally.”

Belarus now heads for a semifinal matchup with either Canada or Finland on Friday at the E Center.

If Sweden entered this game expecting a repeat of their last major meeting with Belarus, a 7-0 win at the 2000 IIHF World Championships, they would find themselves sorely mistaken. But things seemed to be going as planned in the early stages of the first period.

Lidström opened the scoring for Sweden at 3:10 with a Norris Trophy-worthy slapshot that he blew through Mezin’s legs after walking in from the point during a man advantage.

But the Belorussians began to turn the tide during a 4-on-3 Swedish power play. Defenseman Oleg Romanov blew a slapper over Salo’s glove at 7:47 off a faceoff in the Belarus zone.

Dudik made it 2-1 for Belarus at 9:33, accepting an Andrei Kovalev from behind the net and one-timing it home.

The Swedes pressed toward the end of the period, Daniel Alfredsson ringing a shot off the crossbar with less than three minutes left and Ulf Dahlen failing to beat Mezin in the dying seconds. Sweden enjoyed a 22-10 advantage in shots on goal in the first period.

They had a tougher time in the middle frame, as Belarus kept the Swedes to the perimeter and broke up Swedish passes in the neutral zone. Tre Kronor only mustered two shots on goal in the first 6:40, not counting a Kim Johnsson drive off the post.

Swedish frustration mounted and the favored side began to take more physical liberties, leaving Igor Matushkin and other Belarus players crumpled on the ice.

“We couldn’t penetrate their defense,” said Markus Naslund. “They tried to clog it up. We tried to dump it in during the second and get some ugly goals or shots from the outside and try to drive to the net, but it just wouldn’t go in for us.”

Alfredsson got in behind the Belarus defense but could not solve Mezin, while Näslund was foiled on a 2-on-1 shorthanded breakaway late in the period.

Belarus grabbed a 3-2 lead 2:47 into the third, when Andrei Kovalev intercepted a Mattias Öhlund giveaway near the Swedish blueline and used Lidström as his screen to fire a shot along the ice between Salo’s pads. They nearly extended their lead on a 2-on-1 involving Aleksei Kaluzhny and Vladimir Tsyplakov.

Sundin went tit for tat, picking up a horrible Vasily Pankov giveaway and walking in unmolested to score on Mezin for a 3-3 deadlock. For a brief while, it seemed as if Tre Kronor was back in control of its destiny.

But today, something was rotten in the state of Sweden instead of Denmark for a change.

As the crowd urged on the Belorussians, the Swedes found it impossible to get anything going. Näslund failed to score on a rebound at the side of Mezin’s cage, and Mikael Renberg took an unnecessary high-sticking penalty right next to the Belorussian bench. Team Sweden wore masks of disbelieving frustration.

Kopat’s late go-ahead goal prompted Nilsson to pull Salo with less than a minute left, but Sweden couldn’t keep the puck in the Belorussian zone long enough to score.

“It’s devastating,” said Näslund. “It’s the toughest loss I’ve had so far in my hockey career.”

“I think it’s a new page in the history of Belorussian hockey,” said Mezin.

Asked how it feels to be the underdog favorite with the American crowd, Krikunov quipped: “Just try to love us more, and we’ll try to play better.”

It’s hard to imagine them playing any better than they did against Sweden. But that’s why this will be called another Miracle on Ice, with a capital M. This is why they play the games.