Flyers goalie Sam Ersson wins bronze medal with Sweden at world championship

When asked at his end-of-season press conference for the Flyers if he was heading to the IIHF Men’s World Championship, Sam Ersson said with a smile, “Maybe.” He should have said 100% because not only was the Swedish goalie almost unstoppable in net, he led the host team to a 6-2 victory against Denmark in the bronze-medal game Sunday in Stockholm.

After an impressive showing at the 4 Nations Face-Off in February, when he stopped 31 of 32 shots in a 3-1 win against the United States, Ersson went 4-0 in five appearances at the world championships. He allowed just five goals on 76 shots, including shutouts of Latvia and France. His 1.16 goals-against average and .934 save percentage ranked third and fifth, respectively, among goalies in the tournament, with just the gold-medal game between the United States and Switzerland left to play.

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In April, Ersson said he was not too focused on playing for Sweden at the 2026 Milan Olympics, but he certainly threw his hat in the ring on Sunday.

“Obviously, that’s a dream. I think anybody wants to play for the Olympics, but at the same time, it’s not something I’m going to go and focus on,” he said. “I know that is all dependent on how I play and perform here with the Flyers. So just for me, I know on the goalie situation on Team Sweden — we’ve got a lot of good goalies, and I think it’s a good problem for us. For me, I know it’s hard competition, and obviously I’m going to do my best to try to perform and help the team over here, and if I do that, I know that might lead to a chance with Team Sweden, too.”

Sweden has some of the top goalies in the world to pick from, including Jakob Markstrom, who was Ersson’s backup, and Linus Ullmark. There’s no way of knowing where the journey will end, but Ersson’s performances at Avicii Arena are a pretty good start.

Of the five Flyers in the tournament, Ersson is the only one to earn a medal.

Rodrigo Abols finished with two goals in three games, joining Latvia after Lehigh Valley of the American Hockey League was eliminated in the second round of the Calder Cup playoffs. The Latvians finished 10th out of 16 teams.

Tyson Foerster, Travis Konecny, and Travis Sanheim suited up for the Canadians, who were upset in the quarterfinals by Denmark, 2-1. Konecny notched 13 points (three goals, 10 assists) in eight games, tying Nathan MacKinnon atop Canada’s leaderboard. Foerster and Sanheim each had two goals and three points. Sanheim’s second goal was the only one Canada scored in the elimination round, which Konecny assisted on.