U.S. Women’s Hockey Team Advances to Gold Medal Game

The U.S. women's hockey team has advanced to the gold medal game at the Sochi Olympics with a 6-1 semifinal win over Sweden. The Americans peppered the Swiss goal with 70 shots, one shy of the women's Olympic record of 71 as set by the U.S. against China in 2002.

Megan Bozek (BOH'-zehk), Kendall Coyne and Brianna Decker each had a goal and two assists for the U.S.

Team U.S.A. will face the winner of the Canada-Switzerland semifinal, which is being played later today.

The gold medal game will take place Thursday.

The U.S. has medaled in every Winter Games since women's hockey was added in 1998, and just once, with a loss to Sweden in the 2006 semifinals, failed to reach the Olympic championship game.

Thick fog has hit the Olympic city and caused the postponement of two events today.

The men's biathlon mass-start race as well as the men's snowboardcross have both been pushed back until tomorrow.

American snowboarder Nate Holland said the delay is no big deal in his sport because it happens frequently

The biathlon race had already been pushed back from Sunday evening to Monday morning, and was then postponed to mid-afternoon before being called off for another day.

A decision on the women's mass-start race still scheduled for later today has yet to be made.

— The U.S. ice dancing team of Charlie White and Meryl Davis are in position to win the gold today. Following Sunday's short dance they led the competition and training partners Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir (moyer) of Canada by 2.56 points. White and Davis are trying to become the first Americans to ever win the gold in ice dancing. Four years ago they won the silver in Vancouver behind Virtue and Moir.

— To nobody's surprise the U.S./Russia men's hockey game drew good TV ratings. NBC Sports Network says 4.1 million people in the United States watched the Americans' dramatic 3-2 victory, a record number for a hockey game on the channel.

When the game went to a shootout, 6.4 million people tuned in to watch T.J. Oshie score four times to lead Team USA to the win.

The ratings are even more impressive considering the game aired on Saturday morning back home.

— An Italian gay-rights activist says she was detained by police at the Olympics after being stopped while carrying a rainbow flag that read in Russian: "Gay is OK." Police on Monday denied this happened. The woman told The Associated Press she was held for several hours Sunday before she was released. She said she was not charged.

Sochi (SOH'-chee) organizers said today they had no information of any such incident.

A check of the medal tally at the end of competition yesterday showed the Netherlands on top with 17 while Russia and the U.S. each has 16. Broken down the American team has four gold, four silver and eight bronze.