By Amy Tennery
MILAN, Feb 16 (Reuters) – The United States beat Sweden 5-0 in the women’s ice hockey semi-finals on Monday to reach the Winter Olympics gold medal game.
The two-times champions were the favourites heading into Milan and they put on another convincing performance at Santagiulia arena, where Cayla Barnes scored in the first period, while Taylor Heise, Abbey Murphy, veteran Kendall Coyne Schofield and Hayley Scamurra notched second-period goals.
They will play the winner of the semi-final between defending Olympic champions Canada and Switzerland for the gold on Thursday.
Sweden, who won their last medal with the silver in 2006, beat Czech Republic in the quarter-finals but ran out of firepower against the world champions United States.
(Reporting by Amy Tennery in MilanEditing by Christian Radnedge)