MILAN — As Team USA players spoke to reporters on a rainy Thursday morning outside the Olympic Village, Lucas Raymond and Tim Stutzle stood 10 or so feet down the street, suitcases in hand.
The Swede and German dapped each other up, chatted for a few minutes, then waded off into separate Ubers, on their way back to North America.
One day out from the semifinals, it’s getting real.
One bounce the other way and it might’ve been Matthew Tkachuk making his way back to Florida instead of Raymond starting the journey back to Detroit.
“I wouldn’t say it’s weird,” Tkachuk said. “We obviously expected to be in the semifinals, and then we were dealt a really tough task with Sweden. One of us had to go home. Fortunately for us, we’re still here.
“I would have a hard time wrapping my head around it if we were headed home today. It’s very unfortunate for them because they’re a hell of a team and one of the best in the world. They probably deserve to be in the semifinals. So do we. And it was a great game [Wednesday] night. After that meeting [Thursday morning], talked about the Sweden game, we’ve moved on. Now we’re all in on trying to beat Slovakia.”
There is a temptation to overlook the Slovaks, whose nation numbers just 5.45 million and which has won just four medals at the Milan Games, all in ski jumping.
Unlike the Sweden side Team USA beat 2-1 on Quinn Hughes’ overtime goal Wednesday, Slovakia’s roster is only partially made up of NHL players.
On paper, Team USA ought to have the edge.
Ask Stutzle’s Germany side — which fancied its chances against Slovakia in their own quarterfinal Wednesday only to lose 6-2 — about that.
“I think that was a big lottery ticket we kinda tossed away today,” German defenseman Moritz Seider said afterward. “Very manageable opponent.”
That is typical of how people have viewed Slovakia in this tournament, largely to their own detriment. Slovakia has beaten Finland, another semifinalist, and won its group.
They are here for a reason.
“They’re playing really, really well right now. They definitely dominated Germany,” Tkachuk said. “They beat [Germany] more than we beat them, when it comes to control of the game. They played really well that first game against Finland. I actually watched a majority of the game. They played [in] rhythm really, really well.
“They compete hard, they’re big, they use the crowd. We talked about, their crowds have been really good for them. And they’re stingy. They play really hard. Defend really hard and wait for their chances. It’s up to us to make sure they’re trying to defend most of the game.”
In the vacuum of the Olympics, where normal rhythms and time can slip away, Team USA has been getting back to the Village around 1 a.m. after their games, which have uniformly started at 9:10 p.m. locally.
By the time they eat something, calm themselves down and maybe play some cards, it’s after 3.
Everything is pushed back two hours from what would be a normal routine with a 7 o’clock start in the NHL.
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Slovakia has been on a different timetable, with games earlier in the day, so even though all the players are staying in close quarters, the two teams haven’t seen much of each other.
It’s a safe guess that they haven’t thought much about each other either, given that no one would have anticipated this being a semifinal matchup.
Until now.
“We watched the video on our game [Wednesday] night already and our focus shifts right to Slovakia,” Zach Werenski said. “It’s another Game 7 tomorrow and we understand what’s at stake and how good they’re playing right now. We’ll see all the stuff on social media, I’m sure Quinn’s highlights and all that stuff and it’s great. But in terms of focus, it definitely shifts to Slovakia right away.”
If they look ahead, they may find themselves taking a long cab ride to Malpensa Airport on Saturday.
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