USA foil Lions´ Ice Hockey WC dream

The journey of Finland in the Ice Hockey World Championship 2025 has been ended when they lost to United States of America in the quarterfinal in Avicii Arena, Stockholm, Sweden on Thursday.

Although the Finns established their supremacy over the Americans and took lead at the middle of the game, the situation turned reversed within a span of 71 seconds following an alleged unfair decision by the referees.

The refereeing, raised question when two controversial penalties against Finland at 35^th minute of the match changed the situation and reversed the scoreboard for USA as a result the Finns finally left the ground with a defeat by 2 goals to 5.

Conor Garland of USA scored the opening goal at fifth minute of the match but Eeli Tolvanen levelled the score at 13^th minute.

Patrik Puistola scored the second goal for Finland and took 2-1 lead at 28^th minute.

But the situation was changed dramatically when Zeev Buium levelled the score at 35^th minute with one-man advantage during a delayed penalty.

There was still another controversial penalty against Finland and Conor Garland widened the gap at 37^th minute followed by another goal by Shane Pinto.

When the Lions were trying to come back and playing with empty net Clayton Keller scored from long distance ending the world championship journey for Finland.

Meanwhile, Denmark wrote hockey history beating Canada by 2-1 and reached to semi-finals.

Host Sweden and Switzerland also won their own quarterfinals beating Czech Republic and Austria respectively and reached to the semi-finals.