Americans Advance as Latvia Loses

Team USA, which completed the Olympic round-robin with only one win, advanced to the Quarterfinals on Tuesday when Kazakhstan defeated Latvia. With their berth in the next round already determined, the Americans then went on to lose to Russia, 5-4.

After dropping twin 2-1 games to Slovakia and Sweden over the weekend, the United States looked to find it’s offence against the Russians. They succeeded, but goalie Robert Esche (Philadelphia Flyers) and the U.S. blue line couldn’t match the team’s performance with Rick DiPietro (New York Islanders) in the net over the weekend, allowing more goals to Russia than they did to the Slovaks and Swedes combined.

Alexei Kovalev (Montreal Canadiens) scored the game-winner late in the game, with other Russian goals coming from Alexander Korolyuk (San Jose Sharks), Evgeni Malkin, Alexander Ovechkin (Washington Capitals), and Andrei Markov (Canadiens).

The American goals came from Brian Rolston (Minnesota Wild), Brian Gionta (New Jersey Devils), Scott Gomez (Devils), and Erik Cole (Carolina Hurricanes).

Team USA will play top-seeded Finland in the Quarterfinals on Wednesday.