Detroit Red Wing Brian Rafalski scored twice as the United States beat Norway 6-1 in ice hockey at the Vancouver Olympics.
There was a shock in Group B where highly-fancied Russia were beaten 2-1 in overtime by Slovakia.
Lindsey Vonn missed out on an Alpine gold medal double as a crash in the slalom section of the super combined competition handed the title to Germany's Maria Riesch.
Vonn held a 0.33-second lead over best friend Riesch after the morning downhill but the American, with a downhill gold medal already in the bag, straddled a gate and fell on the lower section of the course.
That meant Riesch took the gold while Vonn's American team-mate Julia Mancuso claimed her second silver of the Games after finishing second to Vonn in Thursday's downhill.
Sweden's Anja Paerson picked herself up after her spectacular downhill crash to win a remarkable bronze.
Paerson, whose participation was in doubt after she was flipped into the air on the downhill course, stood seventh after today's downhill section.
But she produced an impressive slalom run to claim the bronze.
Vonn had struggled with a shin injury coming into the Games and she hinted it could make her doubtful for the remaining three Alpine skiing events. The super-G is next up on Saturday.
"It's killing me," she said.
"It hurts so bad. It was really tough on my shin. I hope the next day off will help get it healed."
She added: "I was disappointed but I went down fighting. I knew that Maria and Julia had good runs so I had to give it everything I had and, in slalom, anything goes."
Riesch knew she had won the moment Vonn fell but the German had no qualms about celebrating her friend's fall.
"To be honest, in the first moment you are just happy you won the race," she said.
"But then, I think she was happy that I was slow yesterday. Of course I felt bad for her but she has her gold medal from yesterday.
"Today was a bad day for her, yesterday was a bad day for me. That's sports."
Evan Lysacek won gold for the United States in the men's figure skating, overtaking Russia's Evgeni Plushenko with a spectacular performance in the free skating.
Turin champion Plushenko had led after the short programme with Lysacek in second place.
But the Chicago-born 24-year-old claimed top spot on the podium by just over a point with his routine to Sheherazade by Russian composer Nikolai Rimski Korsakov during which he reeled off eight triples, including two axels.
"I've been waiting for a clean free skate all season," said Lysacek.
"I tried not to get too excited after each jump. I wanted to pump my fist every time."
Speed skater Christine Nesbitt lived up to her billing as favourite for the women's 1,000m by winning Canada's third gold medal of the Games.
But Nesbitt only just edged out Annette Gerritsen of Holland, beating the Dutchwoman by 0.02secs. Gerritsen's compatriot Laurine van Riessen took the bronze medal.
"Today really I didn't have a great race, physically I could feel I wasn't skating well. But I just kept going until the end and it paid off," said Nesbitt.
There was double gold for Norway in the biathlon - Emil Hegle Svendsen in the men's individual 20km and Tora Berger in the women's individual 15km.
Svendsen edged out compatriot Ole Einar Bjoerndalen and Sergey Novikov of Belarus who shared the silver medal.
Berger beat Kazakhstan's Elena Khrustaleva into second place while Darya Domracheva of Belarus was the bronze medallist.
The Norwegians have now taken four medals from the six biathlon events contested so far.
Britain's Amy Williams holds top spot at the halfway mark of the women's skeleton competition at Whistler Sliding Center.
Williams, 27, produced two blistering runs to hold a 0.3 seconds lead from Germany's Kerstin Szymkowiak with Canada's gold medal favourite Mellisa Hollingsworth in the bronze medal position.
Martins Dukurs of Latvia leads the men's skeleton at the same stage, 0.26 seconds ahead of Canada's Jon Montgomery.
Alexander Tretyakov of Russia is in third, 0.84secs off top spot.
The Canadian men's and women's curling teams both seem in formidable form.
Kevin Martin's team continued their unbeaten run as they cruised to a 12-5 win over France while Cheryl Bernard's quartet maintained their 100% record with a 6-5 defeat of Germany.
Uneven match-ups continue to be the story of the women's ice hockey with the United States thrashing Finland 6-0 to cruise into the knockout stages on the back of three wins, 31 goals scored and one conceded.
In the same group, Russia beat China 2-1 but that was not enough to overtake Finland who advance to the semi-finals with the Americans.
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