Could Team USA risk resting Connor Hellebuyck against Slovakia?

The United States’ men’s hockey team clinched their ticket to the semifinals at the 2026 Winter Olympics with a 2-1 overtime win over Sweden on Wednesday.

Quinn Hughes scored in OT to seal the win for the U.S., who will now face Slovakia on Friday with hopes of advancing to Sunday’s gold medal game.

U.S. goaltender Connor Hellebuyck stopped 28 of 29 shots in the winning effort. He is now 3-0-0 with a .958 save percentage (SV%) and a 0.98 goals against average.

“We didn’t come here for a Olympic medal – we came here for the big one,” Hellebuyck told reporters after the game.

On Wednesday’s Daily Faceoff USA vs. Sweden post-game show, Jonny Lazarus and former NHL video coach Steve Peters discuss the United States’ win over Sweden and whether head coach Mike Sullivan should consider starting one of Jeremy Swayman or Jake Oettinger and give Hellebuyck the night off against the Slovaks.

Jonny Lazarus: Here’s a crazy question: Do you feel like you can, maybe, take a chance and rest Hellebuyck in the next game?

Steve Peters: This is a great questi-

Jonny Lazarus: I’d say no, but I think it’s a fair question.

Steve Peters: It is, because the intent was to give Jeremy Swayman that ice time in the second game, but it clearly did not go well for Swayman, and say what you want, but the goal from the red line and the goal from the faceoff, you’d like to see Swayman get those in Olympic competition.

I said in the last game of qualifying that what I would have liked to see against the Germans was they treat it like a preseason game and throw Jake Oettinger in for the third period.

I think it was important, because now you’re going into a situation where Hellebuyck has been great, he’s clearly you’re No. 1, but you got a guy on the bench in Oettinger who hasn’t seen the ice in this tournament.

I am concerned, I don’t think you can go with Oettinger. It’s too late. It had to be against Germany. I dont think there’s going to be too many question marks pointed at Mike Sullivan to make a change.

You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode here…