Captain Jenni Hiirikoski's goal and three assists let Finland past rival Switzerland 4-2 at the 2024 IIHF Women's World Championship iin Utica, New York on Monday afternoon. The win was Finland's first of the tournament.
Finland's success in this game was due to the amount of time the team had possession of the puck.
Finland's top line got to work very quickly in the first period. Only 42 seconds into the game, Susanna Tapani sped into Switzerland's zone. The forward made a nifty move between her legs to leave the puck behind and the Swiss attempted to clear it out. It came to Petra Nieminen who scooped it up and scored the goal.
"There’s three really good players and people for the team," captain Jenni Hiirikoski says. "They have a lot of leadership and experience. It’s really nice to see them back for this tournament again. It’s amazing to see how they work together on and off the ice. They are pushing each other and giving me a lot of energy from each other. They are basically flying when I see Tapani skating. It’s amazing.”
With 5:46 remainiing in the period, Switzerland responded and got their first goal of the tournament. On the point, Lara Christen blasted the puck towards the net. Captain Lara Stalder found a way through a couple of Finnish players for her stick to redirect the puck just enough for it to pass the elbow of Finnish goaltender Sanni Aloha for the score. The goal was Stalder's first of the tournament.
“There's crucial games coming up," goaltender Andrea Braendli says. "We're playing one of the teams in the quarterfinals again, so it's huge that we finally got on the scoreboard and especially from our leaders who have a lot on their shoulders. It's nice to see them succeed, to see a smile on their faces because it's really tough for them to win."
On the powerplay, Finland regained the lead with 7.3 seconds left in the first period. Captain Jenni Hiirikoski passed the puck to Noora Tulus, who launched it to the net. Switzerland goaltender Andrea Braendli made the save but it landed right in front of Ronja Savolainen. Braendli was unable to find the puck and it was too little. too late as Savolainen launched it into the net for the goal.
Finland increased their lead in the second period. Hiirikoski passed the puck to defender Neilli Laitinen, who then blasted it to the net. On the way to the net, it was deflected through the stick of Sanni Vanhanen. With Finland's great ability to create a lot of traffic in front of the net, Vanhanen's redirect went under Braendli's raised glove and into the net 4:51 into the period.
With 6:03 remaining, Finland got assurance by Tapani. Patience paid off for the forward as she circled around Switzerland's zone, wrapped around the net stepped out to make a slight adjustment and then nabbed her firat goal of the tournament.
In the third period, Switzerland scored when Laura Zimmerman got the puck to Sinja Leemann who blasted it past Aloha with 9:11 left in the game.
Finland would seal the win with an empty net goal by Hiirikoski with 1:29 left. The team has completed their premilnary round and will prepare for the quarterfinals.
"After three losses, we wanted to get ourselves on the board," Hiirikoski says. "We did a really good job as a team and it’s nice to get some funnier moments for this tournament. “It was really nice to get a win but it's still a process. This kind of tournament, we need to take step-by-step and we will definitely say again like what we can do a little better and then going ahead to the quarter final.”
Braendli faced 32 shots on net in the loss.
“We missed the start a little bit," Braendli says. "It's tough to get scored on in first minute of game against the team like Finland, which are very skilled, but I'm so proud that we fought back you know, we battled back to what was a tough one. At the end, we scored another one, so super proud that we fought till the end. We tried our best. It wasn't our very best game. There's much more that we can we can do, but I think we can learn from that. It's a long tournament and games like that happen and we just can't hang our heads. Now, we are just going to keep going.”
Switzerland will cap off their preliminary round with a game versus Czechia on Tuesday April 9th, hoping to get their first win of the tournament.
"Czechia has got a very physical, skilled team," Braendli says. "The whole nation and federation has worked tremendously in the past and I think that shows now where they are. They've made some huge development changes and they are a very skilled team. They're going to come out from the beginning. They're going to be very physical. What we have to do is just start from the beginning. I think that's what we did. Yes, today a little, not so good. Like we were a little sloppy in the beginning and which gave them the edge over us. That's the main key for tomorrow is to start from the beginning strong, hold against them, and hopefully score some goals.”