If the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics opening ceremony was a love letter to Italian heritage, the final day was a thunderous operatic finale, a crescendo of clashing sticks, soaring amplitude and the bittersweet tears of legends taking their final bows. As the sun dipped behind the peaks of the Dolomites for the last time this fortnight, the Olympic flame did not just flicker out – it was passed from the high-fashion streets of Milan to the ancient stones of Verona.
The final day’s headline act was the men’s ice hockey final which the weight of a 46-year ghost. Pitting the United States against Canada, the contest fell exactly on the anniversary of the 1980 Miracle on Ice. There was no need for a miracle this time, just the surgical precision of Jack Hughes. After Matt Boldy opened the scoring in the first period, the game transformed into a goaltending masterclass by Connor Hellebuyck, who turned aside 40 Canadian shots in normal time.
Canada, playing without the injured Sidney Crosby AKA Captain Canada, found an equaliser through Cale Makar late in the second, but the golden goal belonged to Hughes. In overtime, he slotted the puck home, securing a 2-1 victory and the first American men’s gold since Lake Placid. “Unbelievable game. Unreal game by our team,” said Hughes. “Just a ballsy, gutsy win. That’s American hockey right there. That’s a great Canadian team, but we’re USA, we’re so proud to be Americans. Tonight was all for our country.”
Hughes, who plays for the New Jersey Devils in the NHL, lost his front teeth before scoring the overtime goal after taking a high stick to the mouth from Canada’s Sam Bennett. “My first thought was to draw the penalty,” Hughes said. “Actually, my first thought was, I looked down the ice and saw my teeth and I was like, here we go again. I’m just glad we got out of that pickle.”
The ice at the curling stadium hosted a different kind of drama: the Swedish Circus. Anna Hasselborg’s rink, featuring three mothers who had all given birth during this Olympic cycle, defeated Switzerland 6-5 in a tactical nailbiter to win the women’s final. Hasselborg, now only the second woman to win two Olympic golds as a skip, managed to please her most important critic – her daughter – who told her before the Olympics that “it’s so boring when you don’t have a medal”.
“I think they will also remember this week,” Hasselborg said of her children. “They understood there was something big happening … I’m so proud to be able to show them that anything is possible.
“Becoming a mother, it’s not always easy to find that balance in motivation and that you want to have the fighting spirit because becoming a mom is so much more important than everything else,” Hasselborg said of herself and her teammates, the three of which became pregannt agter winning bronze Beijing 2022. “But we found it at the right time.”
In the half-pipe at Livigno, the atmosphere was equally electric after China’s Eileen Gu defended her title with a score of 94.75, cementing her status as the most decorated freeskier in Olympic history with six career medals. The 22-year-old revealed after the final that she had learned of her grandmother’s passing just after winning gold. “She was a steamship,” Gu said. “This woman commanded life, and she grabbed it by the reins, and she made it into what she wanted it to be. She inspired me so much. The last time I saw her before I came to the Olympics. She was very sick, so I knew that this was a possibility. I didn’t probably say that I was going to win, but I did promise her that I was going to be brave. She’s been brave.”
Sharing the podium was Great Britain’s Zoe Atkin, who matched her sister Izzy’s 2018 achievement by snagging bronze. Atkin flew, reaching a staggering 5.4m (18 ft) above the pipe – the highest amplitude of the day.
The final medal table saw Norway once again reign supreme with 18 golds and 40 total medals, fuelled largely by Johannes Høsflot Klæbo, who achieved an unprecedented six-for-six gold medal sweep in cross-country skiing. The United States finished a strong second with 12 golds, while the hosts, Italy, celebrated a record-breaking home Games with 30 medals.
As the competition wound down, it dawned that this was the last time we would see many of our favourites in elite competition. Kaori Sakamoto of Japan inspired a generation of figure skaters in her country, bowing out with a silver medal and the honour as the only women’s singles skater from her country to compete at three Games. Canada’s Mikaël Kingsbury bowed out in style with gold in the freestyle skiing dual moguls, clinching a second career Olympic gold. Jessie Diggins retires as the most decorated American cross-country skier ever. And a trailblazer for Great Britain at the Games, the Alpine skier Dave Ryding said of his decision to step away: “I’m ready for the change. I honestly think the next 15 years of British skiing are taken care of. It will only get more and more exciting.”
The Games concluded in the 2,000-year-old Roman amphitheatre in Verona with a closing ceremony that celebrated Italian opera and payed tribute to contemporary Italian classics. The Unesco site hosted a spectacle of dance and LED lights _ replacing traditional fireworks to protect local wildlife. The Italian singer Achille Lauro and ballet star Roberto Bolle bridged the gap between the antique and the avant garde, while the Olympic flag was handed over to the mayor of Nice for 2030. Arrivederci, Italy. Next stop: The French Alps.
The final table
The full emoji medal table in all of its glory. Check out our official medal table here to see what events each country won.
1 🇳🇴 Norway 🥇 18 🥈 12 🥉 11 – Total: 41
2 🇺🇸 United States 🥇 12 🥈 12 🥉 9 – Total: 33
3 🇳🇱 Netherlands 🥇 10 🥈 7 🥉 3 – Total: 20
4 🇮🇹 Italy 🥇 10 🥈 6 🥉 14 – Total: 30
5 🇩🇪 Germany 🥇 8 🥈 10 🥉 8 – Total: 26
6 🇫🇷 France 🥇 8 🥈 9 🥉 6 – Total: 23
7 🇸🇪 Sweden 🥇 8 🥈 6 🥉 4 – Total: 18
8 🇨🇭 Switzerland 🥇 6 🥈 9 🥉 8 – Total: 23
9 🇦🇹 Austria 🥇 5 🥈 8 🥉 5 – Total: 18
10 🇯🇵 Japan 🥇 5 🥈 7 🥉 12 – Total: 24
11 🇨🇦 Canada 🥇 5 🥈 7 🥉 9 – Total: 21
12 🇨🇳 China 🥇 5 🥈 4 🥉 6 – Total: 15
13 🇰🇷 South Korea 🥇 3 🥈 4 🥉 3 – Total: 10
14 🇦🇺 Australia 🥇 3 🥈 2 🥉 1 – Total: 6
15 🇬🇧 Great Britain 🥇 3 🥈 1 🥉 1 – Total: 5
16 🇨🇿 Czech Republic 🥇 2 🥈 2 🥉 1 – Total: 5
17 🇸🇮 Slovenia 🥇 2 🥈 1 🥉 1 – Total: 4
18 🇪🇸 Spain 🥇 1 🥈 0 🥉 2 – Total: 3
19 🇧🇷 Brazil 🥇 1 🥈 0 🥉 0 – Total: 1
19 🇰🇿 Kazakhstan 🥇 1 🥈 0 🥉 0 – Total: 1
— 🟦 AIN* 🥇 0 🥈 1 🥉 0 – Total: 1
21 🇵🇱 Poland 🥇 0 🥈 3 🥉 1 – Total: 4
22 🇳🇿 New Zealand 🥇 0 🥈 2 🥉 1 – Total: 3
23 🇫🇮 Poland 🥇 0 🥈 1 🥉 5 – Total: 6
24 🇱🇻 Latvia 🥇 0 🥈 1 🥉 1 – Total: 2
25 🇩🇰 Denmark 🥇 0 🥈 1 🥉 0 – Total: 1
25 🇪🇪 Estonia 🥇 0 🥈 1 🥉 0 – Total: 1
25 🇬🇪 Georgia 🥇 0 🥈 1 🥉 0 – Total: 1
28 🇧🇬 Bulgaria 🥇 0 🥈 0 🥉 2 – Total: 2
29 🇧🇪 Belgium 🥇 0 🥈 0 🥉 1 – Total: 1
*AIN is the official code for Individual Neutral Athletes, the name used to represent approved Russian and Belarusian athletes. The IOC does not include Individual Neutral Athletes in the official medal table.
Picture of the day
Further reading from the Guardian
How Italians fell in love with their Winter Olympics after gaffes turned into gold
The Great Olympic lie: untold story of Games’ huge environmental impact
USA stun Canada in overtime to win first men’s ice hockey gold since 1980
China’s Eileen Gu soars to ski half-pipe gold but controversy surrounds Zoe Atkin’s bronze
Lindsey Vonn hits back at ‘haters’ who questioned her place at Olympics
Norway (population: 5.7m) beats US (342m) to top medal table
What to look out for next
The Olympics may be coming to a close, but competition will continue when the Paralympics begin on 6 March, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Winter Paralympic Games. Stay tuned for our coverage.
The last word
We are so overjoyed that we cannot feel how tired we are –
the Guardian sports deskItaly’s most senior Olympic official, Giovanni Malagò, after receiving a standing ovation from his fellow IOC members at their games-closing meeting.
Many thanks to all our readers and subscribers. We hope you enjoyed reading the briefing as much as we enjoyed putting it together for the past two weeks. Hit reply or email OlympicBriefing@theguardian.com to get in touch.
