2010 Winter Olympics: Kiprusoff Falls Apart, USA Demolishes Finland

Some days, it just doesn't pay to get out of bed in the morning.

Had Miikka Kiprusoff hit the snooze button on his alarm clock on Friday, and decided to bag in bed the rest of the day, Team Finland likely would have been much better off.

In what will be remembered as an epic failure in Finnish goal-tending history, Kiprusoff allowed four goals on seven shots in the first ten minutes of Finland's gold medal qualifying game against Team USA.

Though most of Team Finland played with nothing resembling emotion or urgency and seemed outright afraid of any physical engagement with the Americans, their doom was expedited by their goal-tender, the one player they hoped could help them repeat as Olympic hockey finalists.

A little more than two minutes into the first period, Kiprusoff came way out of his crease to play a puck sent into Finland's zone.

Though he had control of the puck, he was pressured by an onrushing forward in the form of Team USA's Phil Kessel, and hurriedly tried to pass the puck out of the zone.

Kiprusoff partly whiffed on the pass and, as a result, the puck found its way squarely on to the stick of forward Ryan Malone, who shot it into a wide open net.

Terrible defensive play and an utterly shaken Kiprusoff in net resulted in three more goals before the Finnish net-minder essentially took himself out of the game.

Team Finland head coach Jukka Jalonen replaced him with Minnesota Wild net-minder Niklas Backstrom, who promptly let in goal number five on his first shot faced and goal number six on his third.

With a 6-0 lead at the end of the first period, Team USA needed to do little else than play a conservative, defensive game, which they did for the remainder of the contest.

In fact, the action was so light for USA goalie Ryan Miller, head coach Ron Wilson pulled him late in the third period in order to get Boston Bruins goalie Tim Thomas some playing time.

Finnish forward Antti Miettinen scored a power-play goal at 14:46 of the third period on a deflection that found its way past Thomas.

The US went on to win 6-1 and will face either Canada or Slovakia in the final game of the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Though the loss to Team USA wasn't exactly surprising—the young, energetic team has dominated the entire tournament and is now 5-0—how they lost was a huge shock to a team that counted goal-tending as its strongest asset.

Finland does indeed have an impressive stable of goalies in addition to Kiprusoff, a 2006 Vezina Trophy winner. They had Niklas Backstrom, himself a Vezina finalist just a season ago, and 2006 tournament MVP, Tampa Bay goalie Antero Niittymaki.

In November of 2009, Kiprusoff made headlines as he reportedly told Team Finland GM Jari Kurri that, unless he was going to be the undisputed starter in goal, he needn't bother naming him to the team.

Though obliging Kiprusoff's demand wasn't a bad decision in and of itself, it did put the onus squarely on Kiprusoff to deliver at least a silver medal repeat.

Kiprusoff's relationship with his national team prior to the 2010 Olympic Games was already tumultuous.

After twice refusing to play for Team Finland (2002, 2006), causing fellow Finns such as Teemu Selanne to publicly question his patriotism, the brash move to demand the starting spot in goal for 2010 generated no small amount of controversy.

However, until this game, Kiprusoff had looked solid throughout the tournament and was coming off an impressive shutout victory against the Czech Republic.

Though his defensive support was weak at the very best, Kiprusoff clearly was not ready to play the game against the Americans.

The potential fall-out from Kiprusoff's performance is huge.

As they still have to face the loser of the Slovakia/Canada game tomorrow in the bronze medal matchup, it is unimaginable to think that Kiprusoff will start in goal.

Additionally, it will remain to be seen if the lingering effects of his horrendous performance will damage his NHL team, the Calgary Flames.  

Finally, though he will only be 37, if the NHL decides to participate in the 2014 Olympics, it would be surprising to see Kiprusoff on the roster after this performance.

Nevertheless, it must be said that the American team played an outstanding game and is going to prove very tough to beat if Canada or Slovakia have designs on winning a gold medal.

All may not be lost for Finland inasmuch as they still have a shot at winning a bronze medal tomorrow.

However, should they do this, they will have someone other than Miikka Kiprusoff to thank for it.