Men’s two-man bobsled
Neither snow nor suspicion slowed Germany’s Andre Lange as the world’s fastest bobsled driver turned a twisting Italian track into his own Alpine autobahn.

Todd Hays, the no-nonsense, kickboxing Texan who ended the U.S. bobsled team’s 46-year medal drought with a silver in four-man at the Salt Lake City Games, finished seventh — nearly one second from the podium. The Americans haven’t won a gold medal in two-man since 1936, and they’ve now gone without one of any sort in that event since 1952.

Four years after winning an Olympic gold medal in four-man bobsled, Lange added a two-man gold to his collection, plowing Germany-1 through falling flakes and leaving the sliding world in his icy wake.

Lange and brakeman Kevin Kuske finished with a four-run time of 3 minutes, 43.38 seconds to defeat Canada’s Pierre Lueders, who one day earlier accused the Germans of some funny business with the runners on their high-tech rides.

Lueders and his brakeman, Jamaican-born Lascelles Brown, were .21 seconds back of the Germans and took silver. Switzerland’s Martin Annen captured bronze, duplicating his Olympic feat of four years ago in Utah.

Men’s hockey
O Canada, indeed.

Teemu Selanne scored his sixth goal in four games and Finland stayed unbeaten in Olympic men’s hockey preliminary play, beating gold-medal favorite Canada for the Canadians’ second shutout loss in as many days.

The flying Finns — and they certainly have been while going 4-0 — overcame Canada’s physicality and size advantage with excellent puck movement, transitional play and a strong game in net by Antero Niittymaki, who made 24 saves.

By winning, Finland secured the top spot in Group A and will play the fourth-place team from Group B in the quarterfinals, almost certainly the United States (1-2-1).

Niko Kapanen also scored during a two-goal Finn first period and Niittymaki, of the Philadelphia Flyers, made the lead stand up even as Canada (2-2-0) pressured repeatedly. Canada outshot Finland 19-16 over the final two periods but could not score.

The loss came a day after Canada fell 2-0 to Switzerland — the hockey power’s fist loss ever to that tiny country in Olympic play.

Meanwhile, Slovakia, with four wins in four games, is starting to look like a world hockey power — even if its stars say they haven’t yet performed to expectation.

Pavol Demitra led a 3-on-1 break to set up Marian Hossa’s go-ahead goal in the third period as the Slovaks edged winless Kazakhstan.

The win came a day after Slovakia, which leads Pool B, beat the United States 2-1.

The U.S. fell by the same score for a second straight day, this time to a Swedish team playing without star forward Peter Forsberg.

Daniel Alfredsson scored in the first period and helped set up Mikael Samuelsson’s tiebreaker in the third. The Swedes have clinched a berth in the quarterfinals.

The pre-Olympic worry for the United States focused on the team’s goaltending, but the real problem for the Americans has been offense, with players repeatedly missing golden scoring chances.

Despite the two straight losses, the Americans have all but wrapped up fourth place in Pool B and a berth in the quarterfinals.

Russia also locked up a berth from Pool B with an easy win over Latvia as Ilya Kovalchuk scored four goals. The Russians, who lost their opener to Slovakia, have won their next three by a combined score of 15-2.

In Pool A, Switzerland was unable to follow its Saturday upset of Canada with another win, tying Germany. Tino Boos scored the tying goal for Germany with about 8 minutes left in the third period, as the Germans finally turned sustained pressure on Swiss goalie Danie Aebischer into a score.

The Czech Republic clinched a spot in the medal round with its win over Italy, as Vaclav Prospal scored three goals and Jaromir Jagr returned from a severe cut he suffered in Saturday’s game against Finland.

Men’s curling
The U.S., Finland and and Britain are into the Olympic semifinals, while Norway, Canada, Switzerland and Italy remain in contention for the fourth and final berth.

The U.S. (6-2) clinched its semifinal spot with a morning win over Britain (6-3), then took the night session off.

Meanwhile, Norway had a pair of wins to finish its nine-game round-robin at 5-4 and keep alive hopes of defending its Olympic title. The Norwegians are a half-game behind Canada (5-3), which routed New Zealand (0-8) in the night session.

Canada faces the U.S. on Monday and can clinch a semifinals berth with a win. A loss would send the Canadians into a tie with Norway and the winner of the Monday afternoon match between Switzerland (4-4) and Italy (4-4).

Finland finished the round robin at 7-2 with its win over Britain.

Sweden (3-6) lost twice and is out of medal contention, as is Germany (2-7).

Women’s curling
The U.S. women’s curling team was eliminated from medal contention when Canada beat Italy, leaving no room for the Americans in the semifinals.

The Americans (2-6) then lost to Switzerland on a last shot that gave the Swiss three points in the final end. But by that point it didn’t matter.

Canada improved to 5-3 and joined three other teams with at least five wins. Only Sweden (7-1) and Switzerland (6-2) have clinched semifinal berths in the Olympic tournament; Norway (5-2) is still in contention.

Despite losing five of their first six games, the United States had a slim hope of making the medal round. But it needed to win its last two, for Canada to lose and for Japan (3-4) to beat Britain (4-4).

Japan, Russia (3-4) and Denmark (2-5) also were eliminated. Italy (1-7) previously was knocked out of contention.

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