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David and Goliath The match started as expected – Niklas Lidstrom quickly converted the power play, everything went according to plan and nothing foreshadowed trouble. But then the Swedes, who were already anticipating the main battles in their thoughts, conceded a goal in the power play (!) from Oleg Romanov, and soon after in the minority from Dmitry Dudik. The Belarusians went into the break leading in the score, despite the fact that they lost in shots 10:22. Vladimir Krikunov took advantage of the gap in the game of the Swedish national team. Its head coach Hardy Nilsson used the so-called "torpedo" system - two torpedo forwards, two midfielders and one full-fledged defender. This system allowed him to win two consecutive titles in Sweden with Djurgarden, but in Salt Lake City it turned out to be a failure. The Belarusians sensed the Swedes' lack of determination, believed that they could win, and aggressively counterattacked, taking advantage of the opponent's lack of a second defender. In the second period, Tre Kronor only manages to even the score, nothing more – Mikael Nylander makes the score 2:2. The shocking denouement comes in the third period. First, Andrei Kovalev puts Belarus ahead for the second time, but Mats Sundin quickly restores parity. And two minutes and 24 seconds before the siren, the unthinkable happens. Defenseman Vladimir Kopat, who has only scored on special occasions in his career, crosses the red line and shoots towards the goal. Tommy Salo makes a strange jump and catches the puck flying above the crossbar with his mask, waving past it with his glove. The projectile ricochets off his back and mockingly slowly rolls into the goal. Kopat rushed onto the ice in joy, Salo shook his head in bewilderment. The Belarusians defended exemplarily for the rest of the time, holding the score, and could even have scored into empty net. Five seconds, four, three, two, one… Vladimir Krikunov’s team achieved a seemingly impossible victory, which was immediately dubbed the biggest sensation in hockey since the “miracle on ice”. Music by Epidemic Sound: https://www.epidemicsound.com/music/f...