Canada advances to men’s hockey semifinals with overtime win over Czechia

Team Canada is one step closer to reaching the podium of the Milano Cortina 2026 men’s hockey tournament.

Canada advanced to the semifinals with a come-from-behind 4-3 overtime victory over Czechia in quarterfinal play at the Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena. As the top-ranked team in the preliminary round, Canada will face the lowest remaining seed in Friday’s semifinals.

Mitch Marner scored the overtime winner while Macklin Celebrini, Nathan MacKinnon and Nick Suzuki had regulation time goals. Connor McDavid registered two assists, giving him 11 points to tie the record for most points in an Olympic Games with National Hockey League players. Goaltender Jordan Binnington earned the win in net.

Canada opened Milano Cortina 2026 with a 5-0 win over Czechia. The Czechs finished preliminary round play with a 1-1-1 record and defeated Denmark 3-2 in Tuesday’s qualifying round to advance to the quarterfinals.

Canada, who also beat Switzerland and France in the preliminary round, improved to 4-0 in the tournament and have not lost an Olympic game with NHL players since the preliminary round of Vancouver 2010. This is the first Olympic Games with NHL players since Sochi 2014.

Getting the win was far from easy. Canada trailed by a goal twice in this game, including with under four minutes remaining in regulation times. Suzuki tied the game at 3-3 with 3:27 left.

“I said it earlier, the group is super comfortable being uncomfortable, and that’s what it is,” Canada head coach Jon Cooper said of his team. “It was calm. Everybody had complete faith in whoever was going over the boards. It just felt like it was like a matter of time. It was going to happen. We talked about it in between the periods. Nobody’s stressed if it doesn’t happen in the first five (minutes). It could happen in the last five. That’s the whole point. Like every minute counts the same. And so that was a big theme going in and sure enough it was the last five.”

Celebrini opened the scoring just 3:05 in. McDavid stole the puck near the offensive blue line and found an open Celebrini, beating Czech goaltender Lukas Dostal for his fifth goal of Milano Cortina 2026.

Czechia tied it up at 8:34. After a Canadian turnover in the neutral zone, the Czechs carried the puck in where Roman Cervenka found Lukas Sedlak in front of the goal.

Canada was awarded the game’s first power play at 9:58 but, despite some good puck movement, could not beat Dostal. The Czechs had a great scoring chance immediately after the penalty ended but Binnington made a pad stop off Ondrej Palat.

The Czechs took a 2-1 lead with a power play goal at 14:49. Filip Hronek found David Pastrnak in the circle, who ripped a shot past Binnington, marking the first time Canada has trailed in the tournament.

Cale Makar came close to tying the game early in the second period when he fired a quick shot past Dostal but hit the post. The Canadians picked up the pace as the period went along, generating several scoring chances.

MacKinnon drew a penalty at 11:24 and scored on the ensuing power play. McDavid had the puck at the goal and found MacKinnon in the circle who beat Dostal with a shot through a screen, tying the game at 2-2.

Suzuki had Canada’s best chance to retake the lead before the period ended, firing a shot off the post with a few minutes remaining. Shots ended 17-5 in favour of Canada in the middle frame.

Play tightened up in the third period with shots just 4-2 Canada halfway through the frame.

With 7:42 remaining, Martin Necas carried the puck in and found a wide open Palat, scoring to put Czechia back in front, 3-2.

Canada tied it back up with 3:27 left in the third. A Devon Toews point shot was redirected by Suzuki in front, beating the Czech netminder five-hole.

“Honestly, it was very calm on the bench. Guys stayed really positive,” Suzuki said of the team when they were trailing late. “I think that just comes from all the great leaders that we’ve got on the team. We’re only down one goal and there’s a lot of time left on the clock. We’ve got a lot of big time guys. It’s a full team effort.”

Necas nearly put Czechia back in front with 1:10 remaining, going in alone only to be stopped twice by Binnington.

In overtime, Marner netted the game-winner just 1:22 in, earning Canada a spot in the semifinals. Marner split through Czechia’s defenders and beat Dostal with a backhand shot.

It’s not the first overtime goal for Marner while wearing the red and white. He also scored the OT winner for Canada in a 4-3 victory against Sweden in last year’s 4 Nations Face-Off.

“It’s the it factor, man. Mitch Marner’s got it,” said Cooper. “I’ve watched him in World Championships, 4 Nations, Olympics. I’ve seen it all out of him, and there’s just never a doubt in my mind about throwing that kid over the boards because he doesn’t disappoint. Sometimes your hair falls out at times, but in the end he never disappoints.”

Canada made one lineup change for this game, inserting forward Brad Marchand in place of his Florida Panthers teammate Sam Bennett. Defenseman Josh Morrissey remained out. Captain Sidney Crosby, meanwhile, left the game in the second period and did not return.

This will be Canada’s first trip to the semifinals of the men’s Olympic hockey tournament since PyeongChang 2018, where Canada fell 4-3 to Germany. The Canadians rebounded from that loss in the bronze medal game, beating Czechia 6-4.

Canada is guaranteed to be playing for a medal at Milano Cortina 2026. Following Friday’s semifinals, the bronze medal game will take place Saturday at 2:40 p.m. ET while the gold medal match will be held Sunday at 8:10 a.m. ET.

While Wednesday’s game may have put a scare into Canadian hockey fans, this is what this tournament is, explained Cooper. It was never going to be easy.

“This is what the great thing is about this tournament. This is the Olympic Games. This is the best of the best. This is why all the players want to come to this, because they want to show who they are and they want to flex. And if you think you’re rolling through this tournament, you’re sorely mistaken. And yes, did we like the fact that we won the first three games and didn’t have to play for a qualification game? Hell yeah. But that doesn’t mean you’re going to keep on winning. It doesn’t mean because you’ve got the maple leaf on your jersey that, hey, oh my gosh, you’re going to be first. You’ev got to work to that, and the guys in there know it. We came here to play six games, we’ve played four. Now we’re getting better in four and we’re going to get better in game five. And that’s the mission this group is on.”