Martin Fehervary and the rest of Team Slovakia are officially through to the quarterfinals of the men’s hockey tournament at the 2026 Winter Olympics.
Despite dropping their final game of Group B play to Sweden 5-3 on Saturday, the Slovaks will advance as the group’s winners based on goal differential. The group win was secured when Finland beat Italy 11-0 in regulation, leaving the Finns in second and the Swedes in third.
By topping their group, Slovakia avoided the playoff qualification round and won’t play again until February 18.
Fehervary skated 20:33 in Saturday’s loss, the second-most of any Slovak defenseman. He was a minus-2 in the game and did not fire a shot on goal.
Montreal Canadiens winger Juraj Slafkovsky was the team’s offensive star again, scoring his third goal of the tournament in as many games. Slafkovsky now has six points (3g, 3a) in three games, which currently leads all skaters.
“We don’t have as big names like Sweden or like Canada, right?” Fehervary told the New York Post’s Mollie Walker postgame. “But we got SlafGOALsky. I think he’s a pretty solid player, but we got to play as one team.”
The Slovaks also got a huge goal from St. Louis Blues forward Dalibor Dvorsky with just 39 seconds left in regulation. While the goal only cut the team’s deficit to two, it secured Slovakia’s lead in goal differential.
To try and make up for falling behind, Sweden, still up two goals in the game, pulled their netminder to try and score another goal, but failed. They finish group play 2-1-0, beating the Slovaks and Italians, but falling to their rival Finns.
Sweden is now left on a path to face either Canada or the United States in the quarterfinals. Which of the two teams will be positioned in that spot will likely depend on goal differential. Canada is currently plus-9 after two games, with one game against France remaining, while the US is plus-4 after one game, with games against Denmark and Germany remaining.
