THE ASSOCIATED PRESS


LILLEHAMMER, Norway -- The future of Olympic hockey is tough to predict. About as tough as figuring out what happened in the tournament Sweden just won.


Will there be "Dream Teams" in Nagano in 1998 -- Eric Lindros playing for Canada, Jeremy Roenick for the United States, Sergei Fedorov for Russia? That's being discussed.


Will shoot-outs still decide medal-round games, even when the gold medal is at stake? Maybe that issue should be brought up.


Sweden made use of that device, adopted in 1988, to win its first Olympic hockey gold medal with a 3-2 victory Sunday and destroy Canada's hopes for its first gold in 42 years.


It was a stunning conclusion to a tournament full of surprises.


The loss of talent to the National Hockey League finally caught up with Russia. Its 4-4 record was worse than any of its predecessors from the Soviet Union and Unified Team that won eight of the previous 10 gold medals, losing just six games along the way. The Russians lost the third-place game to Finland and left without a medal, something that never happened to the Soviets and Unifieds.


The Americans, who won the other two golds, also hit a new low with an eighth-place finish. They won just one of eight games, their fewest ever.


Certainly, few could imagine the gold-medal game that would not end.


Sixty minutes of regulation play. Ten minutes of overtime. A five-round shoot-out in which each team scored twice. Still no winner. Time for sudden death.


Both teams missed on their first shots. The next round showcased two youngsters tabbed for NHL greatness -- Peter Forsberg, 20, who Wayne Gretzky called the world's best young player, and Paul Kariya, 19, whose style has been compared to Gretzky's.


Forsberg scored. Kariya didn't. Sweden won. Canada got its second straight silver.


The tournament could be even bigger four years from now.


A proposal for a two-tier system has been made by the NHL. Eight teams would play for two quarterfinal spots. Six other spots automatically would go to countries with the most NHL players -- the United States, Canada, Russia, Sweden, Finland and Czech Republic.


Russia, finally suffering the talent drain that Canada and the United States dealt with for years, likes the idea.


"The idea to get all the best players is not bad at all," Russian assistant coach Igor Dmitriev said.


U.S. coach Tim Taylor, who had the youngest team at the Olympics and made relatively few changes in the group he assembled last August, disagreed.


"It should not be an exercise in some sort of vacation in the regular season to come over here and play eight games and go back," he said. "I don't think that's what the Olympics are all about."


What they are about is perseverance and overcoming obstacles. Sweden persevered for 74 years, from the first Winter Games in 1920, and finally prevailed.