Team USA Photo Gallery: A Grand Opening Night for Utica

Photos from opening night of the Women's World Championship hockey tournament at the Adirondack Bank Center in Utica on Wednesday. Team USA hosted Switzerland in an opening round game on their home turf, and ultimately dominated on the ice with a shut out victory.

Behind two goals from Rochester's Haley Winn, the U.S. Women’s National Team skated past Switzerland, 4-0, in its first preliminary round game of the 2024 IIHF Women’s World Championship at the Adirondack Bank Center Wednesday night.

“There’s a lot of respect there for Switzerland, they stood tough and blocked a lot of our shots coming out in the game,” said John Wroblewski, head coach of the 2024 U.S. Women’s National Team. “We made some adjustments at the blue line to manufacture our offense. We diversified how we attacked in the offensive zone and it paid off.”

Oneida County Executive Anthony Picente and Utica Mayor Mike Galime were on hand to drop the ceremonial first puck on Wednesday night.

Team USA had complete control of the game, but Switzerland had a breakaway opportunity just under midway through the first period. U.S. goaltender Aerin Frankel gloved the hard shot to keep the Swiss off the scoreboard.

"The U.S. blueline broke the ice just over five minutes into the middle frame. After winning a battle behind the net, Hayley Scamurra (Getzville, N.Y.) circled the puck up to Savannah Harmon (Downers Grove, Ill.) at the right point. Harmon passed the puck over to a waiting Haley Winn (Rochester, N.Y.) who fluttered a shot past the Swiss goaltender Andrea Braendli to open the scoring." - Team USA

Notes from the game:

Haley Winn (Rochester, N.Y.) was named Team USA’s player of the game … The U.S. outshot the Swiss, 55-11 … Team USA was 1-for-3 on the power play and 2-for-2 on the penalty kill … Team USA won 88 percent of faceoffs in the contest, with Kelly Pannek (Plymouth, Minn.) winning 14 of 15 draws to lead the way.