Julie Ostergaard scored and Lisa Jensen got a shutout in a tight 1-0 win for Denmark over Hungary, their first ever win in the top division of the IIHF Ice Hockey Women’s World Championship.

Both teams were scoreless through two periods that were full of net-front scrambles. Jensen got the start for Denmark, shutting down Hungary’s top line of Mira Seregely, Emma Kreisz and Fanni Gasparics on multiple occasions.

"I've played with [Kreisz] for basically my whole life," Seregely said of why their line works. "Then our captain Fanni, she's a really good friend of ours. When she came back [to Hungary] from abroad she played with us, so we know each other really well, we know how to play with each other."

With defender Amalie Andersen out of the line-up, Danish captain Josefine Jakobsen (who usually plays at centre) paired up with Sofie Skott.

While Denmark had their fair share of chances in the first 40, including attempts from Michelle Weis and Jakobsen to put one past Aniko Nemeth, Hungary had double the number of shots. Encouraged by constant chanting and drumming from a loud contingent of Hungarian fans, Hungary headed into the third with 30 shots, eight of which came from captain Gasparics. 

Despite Hungary’s efforts, it was Denmark’s Ostergaard who opened scoring at the start of the third period, catching a long pass up ice from Jakobsen and sending the puck top shelf.

"Our captain said ‘who wants to be the hero?’ I always believed it could be me, and hoped that it could be me," said Ostergaard. "That it was me was just incredible."

Hungary continued to put the pressure on Denmark, but the hometown team held on to their lead. Having taken nine penalties and allowed four goals while shorthanded against Czechia, Denmark tidied up their penalty kill and survived all eight penalties they took, including a 5-on-3 in the second period.

"We can’t take that many penalties in a game like this," said Michelle Weis. "I think we are doing the same thing [on the penalty kill] as yesterday, I do think it was working well today. The cross-pass wasn’t coming through. We knew it was a game that we had to win today. Yesterday we could play a little bit more with the feeling of, we can try, but today we really had to win and we came together and we did it as a team." 

Hungary pulled their goalie to gain an extra attacker for the final minute of play, but Jensen valiantly held on for the shutout, making 45 saves.

"We were just told to keep going at every intermission. At the end of the game, we were the better team, we played better, we had much more chances than them," said Seregely. "I don’t know how it didn’t work out, and we just need to keep going for tomorrow. We will let it rest, this game tonight, and then keep playing."

The race to avoid relegation and earn a spot in the quarter-finals has tightened, with Hungary and Denmark now sitting at three points each, followed by Germany with one.