{"id":469165,"date":"2026-02-15T00:40:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-15T00:40:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/469165\/"},"modified":"2026-02-15T00:40:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-15T00:40:07","slug":"we-are-europeans-fans-fly-greenland-flag-during-olympic-us-denmark-ice-hockey-game-winter-olympics-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/469165\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018We are Europeans\u2019: Fans fly Greenland flag during Olympic US-Denmark ice hockey game | Winter Olympics 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two fans who raised a flag of Greenland as the United States played Denmark<\/a> in men\u2019s ice hockey at the Winter Olympics on Saturday say they did so as a gesture of European support for the island and for Denmark.<\/p>\n

Vita Kalni\u0146a and her husband, Alexander Kalni\u0146\u0161, fans of the Latvian hockey team who live in Germany, held up a large Greenland<\/a> flag during warmups and again when the Danish team scored the opening goal of the preliminary round game against the US at the Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are Europeans and I think as Europeans we must hold together,\u201d Kalni\u0146\u0161 told the Associated Press.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Greenlandic people decide what will happen with Greenland, but as it is now, Greenland is a part of the Danish kingdom and, as Greenland is a part of Denmark as in this case, we support both countries against the US.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other US and Danish fans who watched their teams face off Saturday in the Americans\u2019 6-3 win said they believe sports transcends politics amid recent tensions between their governments over Greenland.<\/p>\n

Donald Trump\u2019s rhetoric<\/a> in recent weeks about taking control of Greenland has stirred up national pride in Denmark.<\/p>\n

The red-and-white Greenland flag \u2013 known as the Erfalasorput \u2013 is not flown in an official capacity at the Olympics. The International Olympic Committee only recognizes independent sovereign states, and Greenland is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark.<\/p>\n

Through the first week of the Milano Cortina Olympics, fans have brought the flag to different corners of the Games. It was waved in the grandstands in Anterselva, where the only two Greenlandic athletes<\/a> at the Games competed in biathlon.<\/p>\n

The US was victorious in their preliminary round game against Denmark on Saturday. Photograph: Getty Images<\/p>\n

That the US and Denmark happened to face off in the men\u2019s hockey tournament<\/a> was no extra motivation to the players. Though \u201cU-S-A! U-S-A!\u201d chants from the very red, white and blue crowd filled the arena throughout the game, none of the geopolitics reached the ice, and multiple Denmark players last week downplayed any connection between the Greenland situation and the game against the US.<\/p>\n

But it was a chance for Denmark to ride a wave of patriotism as significant underdogs. Danish forward Nick Olesen was credited with the opening goal after Zach Werenski accidentally knocked the puck into his own net. Matt Boldy tied it for the Americans two minutes later.<\/p>\n

Eleven minutes in, Danish forward Nicholas B Jensen beat US goaltender Jeremy Swayman from 95ft away, just inside the center red line, to go up 2-1.<\/p>\n

Swayman didn\u2019t have to kick himself too badly for the blunder. The US took the lead midway through the second period after goals by Brady Tkachuk and Jack Eichel \u2013 two-thirds of the top line, along with Brady\u2019s brother Matthew.<\/p>\n

Defenseman Noah Hanifin added another when his shot got through Mads Sogaard and trickled over the goalline a bit later, providing some breathing room that proved necessary.<\/p>\n

Jake Guentzel fired a one-timer past Sogaard with a little more than 12 minutes left in the third period, and Jack Hughes scored off a feed from Brock Nelson after Sogaard exited with injury and was relieved by Frederik Dichow.<\/p>\n

Captain Auston Matthews made the pass to Guentzel, and Werenski had the secondary assist to get some retribution.<\/p>\n

After rolling over Latvia 5-1 in their opener on Thursday night behind two goals from Nelson, the Americans have six points in the standings, the same as Canada, going into the final day of the preliminary round.<\/p>\n

The US wraps up round-robin play against Germany. Canada faces 0-2-0 France. If they each win in regulation, the No 1 spot in the single-elimination knockout round would come down to goal differential.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two fans who raised a flag of Greenland as the United States played Denmark in men\u2019s ice hockey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":469166,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-469165","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-united-states-of-america","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","14":"tag-us","15":"tag-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=469165"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/469165\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/469166"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=469165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=469165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=469165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}