HENDERSON, Nev. — After getting passed by countrymen at the 4 Nations Face-Off and passed over by national-team management for the world championships, Sweden’s Linus Ullmark knows he must earn his Olympic dream.
Point blank: the 2023 Vezina Trophy winner is no longer sitting atop his home country’s power rankings. And with Jacob Markstrom healthy, Ullmark could be in tough to crack the top three.
“You shouldn’t take things in life for granted, right? Sometimes you get to experience it firsthand. Sometimes you don’t. But at the same time, I will not be thinking about the Olympics. Because it’s not important. What’s important is what I do now, what I do tomorrow — and that’s going to be together with my fellas in Ottawa,” Ullmark told Elliotte Friedman and Kyle Bukauskas Tuesday during a recording of the 32 Thoughts podcast.
“And if I don’t perform together with them, there’s no chance I’m going to be able to compete with Team Sweden at the Olympics. That’s clear as day.”
32 Thoughts: The Podcast
Hockey fans already know the name, but this is not the blog. From Sportsnet, 32 Thoughts: The Podcast with NHL Insider Elliotte Friedman and Kyle Bukauskas is a weekly deep dive into the biggest news and interviews from the hockey world.
The Senators starter stopped 15 of the 17 shots in 41-plus minutes of work at the 4 Nations Face-Off and saw less action than starter Filip Gustavsson and third-stringer Samuel Ersson during February’s best-on-best teaser tournament.
After Ottawa’s six-game playoff defeat by the Toronto Maple Leafs in Round 1, Ullmark was not asked to represent his country at the IIHF Men’s World Championship.
“I have the interest, but they’ve decided not to go with me,” Ullmark told reporters at the Senators’ end-of-season media availability.
That the worlds were co-hosted in Stockholm, just a drive south of Ullmark’s native Lugnvik, only added to the goaltender’s disappointment.
Sweden instead rolled with a tandem of Ersson and Markstrom.
Ullmark, 32, posted a respectable .909 save percentage during his first season in Ottawa and helped backstop the Sens to their first post-season berth in eight years, but his save percentage tumbled to .880 in the playoff series against Toronto.
To build his Olympic case for Sweden, Ullmark must pour all his focus into the Senators.
“If I go out there and I have subpar numbers and I lose every game or something like that, I wouldn’t want my services there,” Ullmark said.
“It’s my opportunity to shine and prove once again that I should be one of two at the Olympics representing Team Sweden.”
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