Given the recent history between the two teams, the quarter-final matchup between ROC and Switzerland was billed as a game me that could have gone either way and it certainly could have. Following a wild third period that included four goals and another that was called back, Switzerland won 4-2 to advance to the semi-finals.
Alina Muller had three points for Switzerland, and scored the game-winning goal with 2:37 to play, finishing off a give-and-go with linemate Lara Stalder, just 30 seconds after ROC had tied it.
“It was at the end of the shift and I saw that we had a chance, they weren’t really attacking me, they stopped skating, so I thought, ‘Let’s go for one more rush,’” an excited Muller, still out of breath, said after the game. “And then it was just a really nice play by Lara. After that shift I was just done and happy it went in.”
“I’m for sure happy she was on the ice today healthy and she made the difference again today,” Stalder said about Muller, who went down with an injury at last August’s World Championship but now leads Switzerland with eight points in five games in Beijing. “I love playing with her. We push each other She’s phenomenal, she’s one of the best female hockey players in the world and she shows Swiss girls what’s possible.”
“This is what we’ve worked for every day for years,” said Muller, 23, but already in her eighth season and third Olympics with the Swiss national team. “This is just a moment that you live for and being able to spend it with these girls is unbelievable and we want more – we want to win a medal. We’re not done.”
But along with the thrill of victory in a big game comes the agony of defeat.
“We made some big mistakes,” said ROC defender Angelina Goncharenko. “We didn’t score, they didn’t award us a goal, we didn’t get over it and we lost. That third goal hurt us and after it we didn’t play the right way to get back into the game.”
“It’s very hard to take. It’s hard to say what happened because it’s not how we were hoping. I can’t put it into words,” said ROC forward Alexandra Vafina. “We were missing a couple of players. Some of them came back from protocol so we had four full lines, but not quite the roster we had at the beginning.”
ROC was missing some key players but Switzerland was also without Lisa Ruedi, who played in all four group games and whose jersey number 12 hanged from the glass behind the Swiss bench throughout the game, and was carried by forward Rahel Enzler after the game.
“She’s a big part of our team, no matter if she’s here now or not. She’s supporting us and we can feel her support,” said Enzler. “We said in the dressing room, ‘Let’s win for Lisa’ so she can play with us in the next game.”
These two teams have seen a lot of each other in recent years. Four years ago in PyeongChang it was ROC that beat Switzerland 6-2 in the quarter-finals. They’ve met four times in the two World Championships since then, with Switzerland finally getting a win in the quarter-finals last August in Calgary 3-2 in overtime, with Laura Zimmermann scoring the winning goal.
Switzerland outshot ROC in this game 36-24, including 19-10 in a wild third period.
With each team coming out fast off the opening faceoff trying to get the all-important first goal, the action went back and forth for the first six minutes or so, with both goalies looking sharp. But after a while, the play settled down. Each team had a power play in the back half of the opening period but didn’t generate much from it, but the only real chance in the latter half of the period was by Switzerland at 5-on-5, with Zimmermann deflecting a shot just wide in front of a screened Valeria Merkusheva.
After the second period began at much the same pace as the first finished, things began to pick up around the midpoint with a flurry of action around the ROC net. Then the two teams exchanged goals in the last six minutes of the period.
The Swiss struck first, with Muller taking the puck down below the goal line and passing out front to Phoebe Staenz, who got her stick free for the one-timer despite being double-teamed.
While they were still announcing the goal in-house, Zimmermann very nearly made it 2-0, with Merkusheva just blockering her shot over the crossbar.
ROC tied it on a somewhat similar play three minutes later, with Anna Shokhina’s pass finding Anna Savonina in front. Savonina’s shot went off the back crossbar and out so quickly that the referee didn’t immediately see it and play continued despite the goal horn sounding and several players stopping in confusion. As the officials went to video replay, the ROC players were so confident of a goal that they began celebrating, and sure enough the goal was quickly confirmed.
Similar to the first period, the teams came out to start the third period at a high pace. The Swiss had the first good chance, with Lena Marie Lutz and Alina Marti combining only to be denied by Merushkeva, and then Anna Shibanova at the other end, circled the Swiss net and tried to beat Andrea Braendli on the near side but hit the post.
The ROC team thought it had taken the lead with about 13 minutes to play when a shot dribbled through Braendli and barely crossed the goal line. However, the Swiss players and staff thought they had seen the puck hit the curved glass at the corner of the bench earlier on the play, and upon a video challenge, their suspicions were confirmed, the goal was taken back and the clock was reset to 13:40.
“It hit the glass and changed direction and came back again,” said Enzler, who had a good view of the play from the bench. “We were sure that we had to take that challenge and it would be overturned.”
Then just over a minute later, the Swiss did take the lead. On a 2-on-1 break, Kelly Moy perfectly teed up a pass for Dominique Ruegg. Using her left-handed shot from the right side, Merushkeva had little chance on the one-timer.
But there was still plenty of time left, and there was still plenty more drama.
“Once that got called back, we knew the momentum was on our side and we just had to keep pushing and we got a goal from Domi that was really important,” said Muller. “Then we had a hard time keeping calm after we scored. We were a little overexcited and we have to learn from that.”
ROC tied it with 3:07 to play, with Polina Luchnikova burying a rebound for her fourth of the tournament. But the tied score lasted just 30 seconds, with Muller finishing off a pretty pass by Lara Stalder into an empty net, with Merkusheva again left to her own devices after being abandoned by her defence.
“We lost goals because of quick counter attacks,” said Merkusheva, the 22-year-old ROC goalie who did everything she could for her team in this game and throughout the tournament. “Somewhere, we didn’t deal with our emotions. Of course we were nervous before the game but if you play the game with courage, nerves shouldn’t enter into it.”
“I don’t know what happened,” Vafina said about the winning goal. “It was just a bad play and they were 2-on-1. I wouldn’t say we relaxed. It’s the quarter-finals, there’s no room for relaxing.
“The third period was full of scoring chances, and I guess Switzerland just took advantage because they scored on two of their quick attacks.”
ROC had one more chance when Moy was called for tripping with 1:47 left, but Muller put away the game in the dying seconds with a shorthanded empty-netter in, her second goal and third point of the game.
“We produced that goal but there were a lot of pieces involved in this win,” said Stalder, the Swiss captain who had two assists in the game. “Ruegg stepped up with a big goal and that PK at the end, we killed it off. It was back and forth but I think we were the better team and deserved this win.”
“It’s not the way we wanted to finish this tournament, but it is what it is,” said Vafina. “It’s a team game and we all have to do the right thing to get a better result, and it just didn’t happen.”
