Canada’s women’s hockey team edged the United States to win its fifth Olympic gold medal Thursday as expected. But the longstanding rivalry between the two teams is less David vs. Goliath than Goliath vs. his slightly less frightening younger brother.
The U.S.-Canada hockey rivalry is almost always gold
The world’s two best women’s teams battled as usual, and once again, Canada won
U.S. vs. Canada in Olympics
and world championships
United States
Canada
Olympics
30.0% (3 games) won
70.0% (7) won
World championships
50.0% (15)
50.0% (15)
Both
45.0% (18)
55.0% (22)
50%
U.S. gold medals
Canada gold medals
Olympics
2
5
World championships
9
11
U.S. vs. Canada in Olympics
and world championships
United States
Canada
Olympics
30.0% (3 games) won
70.0% (7) won
World championships
50.0% (15)
50.0% (15)
Both
45.0% (18)
55.0% (22)
50%
U.S. gold medals
Canada gold medals
Olympics
2
5
World championships
9
11
U.S. vs. Canada in Olympics
and world championships
Canada
United States
30.0% (3 games) won
70.0% (7) won
Olympics
50.0% (15)
50.0% (15)
World championships
45.0% (18)
55.0% (22)
Both
50%
U.S. gold medals
Canada gold medals
2
5
Olympics
9
11
World championships
The world’s two top teams have elbowed and hip-checked nearly everyone else out of the gold medal games at the Olympics and world championships since the first title match in 1990. Each has missed a final only once: The U.S. team lost to Sweden in a 2006 Olympic semifinal, and Canada lost to Finland in a 2019 world championship semifinal.
In fact, Finland and Sweden are the only teams to have beaten or tied either Canada or the United States in any game in any round of either of the world’s two biggest tournaments.
United States vs…
0 games
10
20
30
1 lost
Finland
Russia*
Sweden
Switzerland
Japan
1 tie
1 lost
Canada vs…
0
10
20
30
Finland
Russia*
Sweden
Switzerland
Japan
Germany
2 lost
* Includes Russia Federation, Olympic Athletes
from Russia and ROC.
United States vs…
0 games
10
20
30
1 lost
Finland
Russia*
Sweden
Switzerland
Japan
1 tie
1 lost
Canada vs…
0
10
20
30
Finland
Russia*
Sweden
Switzerland
Japan
Germany
2 lost
* Includes Russia Federation, Olympic Athletes from Russia
and ROC.
United States vs…
Canada vs…
0 games
10
20
30
0
10
20
30
1 lost
Finland
Russia*
Sweden
Switzerland
Japan
Finland
Russia*
Sweden
Switzerland
Japan
Germany
1 tie
2 lost
1 lost
* Includes Russia Federation, Olympic Athletes from Russia and ROC.
“I think it is the best rivalry in sports," said U.S. forward Hayley Scamurra after the Americans beat Finland on Monday in Bejing to secure their spot in the final. "You can feel it when you are watching it, and when you are doing it, it is that much more.”
The teams’ overall head-to-head record on the world stage is close, but Canada’s 5-2 lead in Olympic gold medals feels enormous. And this year’s Canadian team may be its best one yet.
Here’s how the Olympic arch-rivalry started, and how it’s going:
1998
The U.S. takes the first gold
3-1
U.S.
CANADA
3-1
U.S.
CANADA
Canada dominated the women’s game from the earliest days of international play and had beaten the U.S. team in the four world championships before the first Olympic contest in Nagano. But the Americans had improved mightily over the past decade.
They beat the Canadians in an early round-robin match, then absolutely stunned them by winning the first-ever Olympic gold medal in women’s hockey.
“It was a real empty feeling to lose,” Canada Coach Shannon Miller said at the time. “But when they showed [U.S. captain] Cammi Granato’s face on the big screen and the medal around her neck, my feelings changed completely. I realized a gold medal was being hung around the neck of a female hockey player, and I couldn’t believe the effect it had on me.”
The United States wouldn’t win gold again for 20 years.
2002
Canada gets revenge on enemy ice
3-2
CANADA
U.S.
3-2
CANADA
U.S.
The U.S. team carried a 35-game winning streak into the Olympics in Salt Lake City — including eight straight victories over Team Canada — and both teams rolled through the early rounds, itching to face each other.
''That’s what we play for,'' said Granato before the gold medal game. ''When we play Canada, it’s just a battle. We just don’t like each other on the ice.''
Canada won the battle and an Olympic gold medal in its national winter sport for the first time since the men’s team won in 1952. It was the beginning of a 24-game Olympics winning streak and the first of four straight gold medals.
2006
Sweden makes a cameo
CANADA
SWeden
United States
CANADA
Sweden
United States
Most of the hockey-watching world assumed the two superpowers would meet in the final at Turin as usual, and maybe this time Team USA would recapture gold. Instead, the Americans were the losers in a Hollywood ending.
In the semifinal match against Sweden, the U.S. team took a 2-0 lead as expected. But the Swedes tied the score and went to overtime with visions of a massive upset dancing in their heads.
Thanks in part to repeated screenings of the movie “Miracle" during training, Swedish goalie Kim Martin said she began to channel Jim Craig, the U.S. goaltender in the improbable upset of Soviet Union in the 1980 Olympics semifinal. “I want to be like him," Martin said after the game. "You want to win when you’re not supposed to win.”
Overtime came and went, and in the shootout, Martin blocked every shot, a feat her U.S. counterpart, Chanda Gunn, couldn’t match. Sweden claimed its own “Mirakel," and Canada won its second gold.
2010
Captain Clutch runs over the U.S.
2-0
CANADA
U.S.
2-0
CANADA
U.S.
The U.S. team cruised through its three preliminary-round games and walloped the Swedes, 9-1, in a semifinal. Then it ran into a red-white-and-brick wall.
Canadian goalie Shannon Szabados stopped all 28 of Team USA’s shots. At the other end of the ice, Canada’s youngest player, 18-year-old Marie-Philip Poulin, scored twice in the first period. Poulin later would earn the nickname “Captain Clutch,” and, as a veteran leader on the 2022 team, would score two goals in the Beijing final as well.
2014
Canada makes it four in a row
3-2
CANADA
U.S.
3-2
CANADA
U.S.
After the Vancouver Games, where the two superpowers drubbed their preliminary-round opponents by a combined score of 72-3, then-IOC president Jacques Rogge warned that the sport could lose its Olympic standing unless it became more competitive. The rules were tweaked for Sochi to give other teams more of a chance, but the change only postponed the inevitable.
Team USA carried a 2-0 lead deep into the third period, but Canada scored twice in the last three-and-a-half minutes, including on a shot that ricocheted off a U.S. defender’s leg and into the goal. Canada won in overtime on a goal by — you guessed it — Poulin.
2018
The U.S. breaks the streak
3-2
U.S.
CANADA
3-2
U.S.
CANADA
“This is the team,” U.S. captain Meghan Duggan declared at the beginning of the PyeongChang tournament, the team that would finally wrestle another gold medal out of Canada’s grasp.
The squads were so evenly matched that the final ended in a tie requiring overtime, and then a shootout, and then the shootout required extra shots. Finally, Team USA’s Jocelyne Lamoureux-Davidson finessed a puck into Canada’s net, and 20-year-old U.S. goaltender Maddie Rooney stopped a shot by Canada’s Meghan Agosta, and the U.S. team had its second Olympic gold medal.
2022
Canada takes a fifth
3-2
CANADA
U.S.
3-2
CANADA
U.S.
Star center Brianna Decker was injured 10 minutes into the first U.S. game in Beijing, leaving the Americans’ offense a bit less fearsome than usual. Meanwhile, Canada torched its first six opponents by an average of nearly eight goals, including a 4-2 searing of Team USA, as it rocketed to the final.
So when Canada scored the first three goals in the gold medal game — the first three-goal lead in any of the U.S.-Canada gold medal battles — it appeared a rout was in the making. Of course, that is not how this rivalry works.
The Americans clawed back with a shorthanded goal from Hillary Knight in the second period and kept firing, outshooting Canada 40-21, but the stout Canadian defense held firm.
At the end of a frenzied third period, with six U.S. skaters on the ice and 12.5 seconds left, Amanda Kessel snuck the puck past goaltender Ann-Renée Desbiens to get the score to 3-2.
The clock ran out on Team USA. But for the two most formidable powers in women’s hockey, there’s always next time.