It was 30 years ago today. Well, technically, the Gold Medal Game of the 1995 Ice Hockey World Championship was played at the world’s largest spherical building – the.arena then called the Stockholm Globe Arena, now Aviciii Arena – exactly 30 years and five days ago, but the celebration the nation’s first gold medal kickstarted was certainly no signs of dying five days later.
To a generation of Finnish hockey fans, the arena will always be linked to the game in which Finland beat their archrivals, Sweden, 4-1, in Sweden, no less.
A victory doesn’t get any sweeter than that.
As is still often the case, Finland entered the tournament as a wild card, behind the usual suspects, Russia, the Czech Republic, and of course, the 1991 and 1992 world champions, and 1993 silver medalist, Sweden.
However, the team believed in themselves. At their first event of the new season, their Swedish coach Curt Lindstrom handed out a booklet titled, “Gold in Globen.”
Back in 1995, the home-ice curse – that wouldn’t be broken for almost twenty years – was just ten years old, not quite a thing yet. Not enough of a thing for the Swedes to be worried anyway. What did concern the Swedes, and the Canadians, was the NHL lockout that extended the NHL regular season to May 3, the day of the Ice Hockey World Championship quarterfinals in Stockholm.
Finland’s big stars were still young, and they had stayed in Europe to play in the 1994 Olympics in Milan, Italy, where the team also proved they could not only keep up with the big boys, but that they just might be big boys themselves.
Lindstrom brought with him a management style that was unusual to most Finns. He listened to the players, and he trusted them to do the best decisions on the ice.
Finland had one of the tournament’s best lines in Saku Koivu – Ville Peltonen – Jere Lehtinen (who is the team Finland GM today).
“Koivu was the brain of the line, Peltonen the goal scorer, while Lehtinen worked hard and played defensively. They scored a lot of goals in the tournament,” Lindstrom told this reporter for a 10th anniversary book on the team.
A depleted Canadian roster also helped Finland’s road to gold medals. The Finnish Llons finished second in the group and played their quarterfinal against France who had managed to finish third, ahead of Canada, behind Russia and Italy. In the semifinal, Finland beat the Czech Republic, 3-0, while Daniel…
To a generation of Finnish hockey fans, the arena will always be linked to the game in which Finland beat their archrivals, Sweden, 4-1, in Sweden, no less.
A victory doesn’t get any sweeter than that.
As is still often the case, Finland entered the tournament as a wild card, behind the usual suspects, Russia, the Czech Republic, and of course, the 1991 and 1992 world champions, and 1993 silver medalist, Sweden.
However, the team believed in themselves. At their first event of the new season, their Swedish coach Curt Lindstrom handed out a booklet titled, “Gold in Globen.”
Back in 1995, the home-ice curse – that wouldn’t be broken for almost twenty years – was just ten years old, not quite a thing yet. Not enough of a thing for the Swedes to be worried anyway. What did concern the Swedes, and the Canadians, was the NHL lockout that extended the NHL regular season to May 3, the day of the Ice Hockey World Championship quarterfinals in Stockholm.
Finland’s big stars were still young, and they had stayed in Europe to play in the 1994 Olympics in Milan, Italy, where the team also proved they could not only keep up with the big boys, but that they just might be big boys themselves.
Lindstrom brought with him a management style that was unusual to most Finns. He listened to the players, and he trusted them to do the best decisions on the ice.
Finland had one of the tournament’s best lines in Saku Koivu – Ville Peltonen – Jere Lehtinen (who is the team Finland GM today).
“Koivu was the brain of the line, Peltonen the goal scorer, while Lehtinen worked hard and played defensively. They scored a lot of goals in the tournament,” Lindstrom told this reporter for a 10th anniversary book on the team.
A depleted Canadian roster also helped Finland’s road to gold medals. The Finnish Llons finished second in the group and played their quarterfinal against France who had managed to finish third, ahead of Canada, behind Russia and Italy. In the semifinal, Finland beat the Czech Republic, 3-0, while Daniel…
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