Like a lot of the members of the team that represented the USA at this year’s IIHF World Championship, Tage Thompson has had success at the U-18 and U-20 levels internationally, but gold had eluded him at this level.
From two previous trips to the Worlds, he had taken home two bronze medals. Other players were in the same boat, and the way they spoke for the last two weeks, they thought it was time to change that.
“It’s been a fun tournament,” Thompson said when it was all over. “We have an unbelievable group of guys in that locker room and I couldn’t be happier to be on this side of things with them.”
Thompson himself had a huge tournament. At each of his two previous World Championships, he scored one goal each. This time he scored six, tied for the team lead with Frank Nazar. The sixth goal, of course, was the golden goal – the only goal of the final against Switzerland.
“Honestly, I don’t even know,” he smiled when asked to describe his feelings when he saw the puck go in. “Just pure excitement, pure joy. It didn’t feel real. It still doesn’t. I’m just excited to get into that locker room and celebrate with the guys.”
This was a talented group, but the U.S. team often is. Early results, like the 3-0 loss to Switzerland in the group stage and the 6-5 overtime win over Norway didn’t look necessarily give the outside observer reason to think this year would be different, but the team got better as the tournament progressed. The USA came from behind to beat Czechia in its last group game, then rather convincingly beat two more legitimate gold-medal contenders in Finland and host Sweden to reach the final.
“I think anytime you come to this tournament, you should come here to win,” said Thompson. “I don’t know if that’s always been the case in the past, but I think with this group, we’ve taken this very seriously and we came here with the goal and the mindset that we were going to win gold and we weren’t going to be denied.
“I think everybody in that room bought into that, and I think we felt from day one that we were going to win this thing.”
Photo © Timothy T. Ludwig-Imagn Images: Tage Thompson playing for the Buffalo Sabres in the 2024-25 season.
