Team Sweden and Team Finland failed to win gold at the 2026 Winter Olympics, but that doesn't mean there's not room for optimism for both teams at the next Olympics. Finland fared better at this year's Olympics, but will the Swedes turn the tables at the 2030 Games?
The 2026 Winter Olympics men’s hockey tournament ultimately leaves all but one team disappointed, but just because you didn’t win gold – or because you wound up out of the medal mix and failed to get to the podium – that doesn’t mean you didn’t have a good Olympics.
Teams can still see progress or witness good elements even if you don’t win all your games, so that’s worth bearing in mind when you call a team successful or unsuccessful.
That said, there’s always going to be a linkage between the two Scandinavian teams – Sweden and Finland – when it comes to comparisons of Olympic success.
In this year’s Games, the Finns turned out to be better than the Swedes despite Sweden having better depth, in this writer’s opinion. Finland will play for bronze on Saturday, while the Swedes went out in the quarterfinal at the hands of the American team on Thursday.
But does that typically plucky performance from Finland mean they’re going to be the favorites to finish ahead of Sweden four years from now at the 2030 Games in the French Alps? We don’t think so. As a matter of fact, we’re quite confident the Swedes will have better odds at winning gold than Finland will. Just by looking at the two rosters, you can see why Sweden will be favored over Finland in the next Olympics.
For starters, the Swedes will have an abundance of talent and very little roster turnover. They’re still going to have Toronto Maple Leafs star right winger William Nylander, Los Angeles Kings star winger Adrian Kempe and Minnesota Wild center Joel Eriksson Ek, all of whom are currently 29 years old.
Meanwhile, Sweden’s 2030 team will still have Nashville Predators star winger Filip Forsberg, who is 31. It’s still going to have Buffalo Sabres star defenseman Rasmus Dahlin (25 years old), Detroit Red Wings star winger Lucas Raymond (23), and Wild goalies Filip Gustavsson (27) and Jesper Wallstedt (23).
That’s a lot of talent. And while there will be some turnover for Sweden – mainly on defense, with veterans Victor Hedman of the Tampa Bay Lightning and Oliver Ekman-Larsson of the Leafs possibly being retired by that point – the Swedes also will have new elite players to build around. The key player in that regard is projected top two pick in the 2026 NHL draft, Ivar Stenberg, who will be 22 years old in the 2030 Games.
Finland defeated Sweden 4-1 in their 2026 Olympics matchup. (Marton Monus/Reuters via Imagn Images)But we think we can all agree the Finns aren’t that far off from having elite depth to rival Sweden’s in 2030. Star defenseman Miro Heiskanen of the Dallas Stars will only be 30 at the 2030 Games. Star forward Sebastian Aho of the Carolina Hurricanes will be 32. Center Roope Hintz and right winger Mikko Rantanen of the Stars will both be only 33. Florida Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov and goalie Juuse Saros of the Predators will be 34.
That’s a core that can put a scare into a very good opponent, the way the Finns did against Canada in the semifinals of this year’s Olympics. Finland almost always finds a way to be better than the sum of its parts, so in some regards, it would be tempting to come out and say the Finns will do better at the 2030 Games than Sweden will.
However, when you put the two teams side-by-side, you have to go with the Swedes over the Finns in 2030. On paper, at least, Sweden has a deeper group of elite talent than Finland does.
Things might be different if an unknown Finnish player or two rise to the top and give their country the edge over the Swedes, but with Leo Carlsson, Anton Frondell and Stenberg all projected as high-end talent for the Swedes by 2030, the Finns will have a lot to do to mitigate the talent gap.
But that’s the beauty of these best-on-best tournaments – the parity in these games means there’s really no lock to win it all. That should give both Scandinavian teams plenty of optimism at the next Olympics.
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