Only medals are good enough for Sweden at the World Championships. Failure in the quarter-finals on Thursday evening against Switzerland, who have an unblemished record to date, would not live up to the high expectations.
28.05.2026, 09:44
SDA
Sweden is regarded as an exemplary nation in ice hockey when it comes to developing young talent. This season, the Scandinavians won gold medals at both the U18 and U20 World Championships. But in the adult competition, the eleventh and last world championship title was eight years ago, when the Swedes defeated Switzerland 3:2 on penalties in the final.
They subsequently failed to reach the quarter-finals four times in a row before winning bronze twice in the last two years. At this year's Winter Games, they finished in 7th place after losing 2:1 after extra time in the quarter-finals against the eventual Olympic champions. This does not meet their own high standards, where only medals count at the major tournaments.
The Swedes have not lived up to expectations at this World Cup so far. They only qualified for the quarter-finals on the last day of the preliminary round thanks to a 4:2 win against Slovakia - although a win after 60 minutes was necessary to progress. Before that, they had lost to Canada (3:5), the Czech Republic (3:4) and above all Norway (2:3).
Experience and plenty of talent
The Swedish squad consists of twelve NHL players, including defensemen Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Mattias Ekholm as well as forward Lucas Raymond. The former has played over 1000 games in the best ice hockey league in the world, 1199 and 1091 respectively. Ekholm formed a duo with Swiss Roman Josi for a long time with the Nashville Predators. Raymond has scored 83 goals and 145 assists in 244 games for the Detroit Red Wings in the last three NHL seasons and is currently the best Swedish scorer at this World Championship with eleven points (five goals). In addition to plenty of experience, the team is also full of promising talent - five players were born in 2006 or younger. One of them is 18-year-old Ivar Stenberg, who has shone in the preliminary round with four goals and four assists.
The team is coached by Sam Hallam, who will be at the helm of Genève-Servette from next season. The 46-year-old is impressed by the Swiss game, which is why he has great respect for the World Cup hosts, who had an unblemished record in the preliminary round. Nevertheless, they are expected to reach the semi-finals at home and failure to do so would be a huge disappointment.
