PYEONGCHANG, South Korea — Great Britain has beaten the U.S. to advance to the quarterfinal round of the Alpine team skiing event, which is making its debut at the Pyeongchang Olympics.

Quite a few of the world’s top racers skipped the competition, including American Mikaela Shiffrin and Austrian Marcel Hirscher.

The competition has 16 countries seeded for a bracket-style tournament. Each team has four racers — two men and two women — competing in 1-on-1, side-by-side parallel runs.

Each race victory is worth one point. If the score ends up at 2-all, the tiebreaker is the lower combined time of each team’s fastest man and fastest woman.

That’s how Great Britain beat the U.S. after their match was tied at 2. Also advancing are top-seeded Austria, Sweden, Norway, Italy, France, Germany and Switzerland. Medals will be awarded Saturday.

Canada upset again

GANGNEUNG, South Korea — First curling, now this.

It has been a rough few days for Canada at its best Winter Olympics ever because of struggles in the two sports that are most tightly woven into its national identity.

In perhaps the biggest blow of all, the men’s hockey team didn’t even make it to the final courtesy of a stunning 4-3 loss to Germany on Friday night in the semifinals. For a nation already in despair over no men’s or women’s curling medals and the women’s hockey team losing to the rival Americans in a shootout in the gold-medal game, this one won’t be easy to swallow as Canada’s bid to win three consecutive Olympic golds fell horribly short.

Through 14 days, 10 of Canada’s best-ever 27 medals are gold.

Losing to Germany guaranteed none will be in hockey.

“They came out ready to play,” Canada forward Rob Klinkhammer said. “We didn’t. They were the better team.”

Without NHL stars Sidney Crosby and Drew Doughty, elite goaltender Carey Price — and no Stanley Cup-winning coach Mike Babcock, either — Canada was skated out of the building by coach Marco Sturm’s team that now faces an even stiffer test in the favored Russians in Sunday’s final.

After winning back-to-back gold medals in Vancouver in 2010 and Sochi in 2014, and three of the past four dating to 2002, Canada’s self-described band of journeymen will play the Czech Republic for bronze on Saturday.

“We did not match their work ethic,” Canada forward Derek Roy said. “It stings a lot. It is not a good feeling to lose a game like that.”

Canada has only settled for a bronze medal twice in 21 previous Olympic men’s hockey tournaments and took home gold or silver in each of the six games with women’s hockey.

“Disappointed, for sure,” coach Willie Desjardins said. “Everybody’s disappointed. We knew what we wanted and we worked hard to get here and we came up a little bit short.”

Canada will likely play for bronze without top-liner Gilbert Brule, who was ejected for a brutal hit to the head of David Wolf at center ice, one of several bad penalties by an uncharacteristically undisciplined team.

Desjardins and his staff made some adjustments at the first intermission, but never called a timeout when Germany went up 3-0 or 4-1. Kevin Poulin was starting in net because No. 1 goalie Ben Scrivens injured his shoulder/collarbone area in a collision in the quarterfinal against Finland, and he allowed goals scored by Brooks Macek, Matthias Plachta, Frank Mauer and Patrick Hager on 15 shots.

Poulin refused to speak to reporters afterward. There weren’t many answers for what happened to the team that had looked dominant against Finland.

Done or not done?

PYEONGCHANG, South Korea— Mikaela Shiffrin is not quite convinced Lindsey Vonn’s Olympic career is done.

“Whenever I hear anybody say something about this,” Shiffrin said Friday, “it’s like, `most likely,’ `probably,’ `maybe,’ `we’ll see,’ `not sure.’ I’m like, `Knowing Lindsey, I don’t believe her.”’

And with that, Shiffrin let out a big laugh.

She is, without a doubt, the heir apparent to Vonn as the leader of U.S. ski racing. They were the only two members of the country’s Alpine team to earn a medal at the Pyeongchang Games — and the only two to hold news conferences a day after the sport’s last two individual events.

First came Vonn, 33, wearing her downhill bronze medal. After she left the room, it was time for Shiffrin, 22, whose gold from the giant slalom and silver from the combined dangled from her neck.

Schairer coming back

VIENNA — The Austrian snowboarder who broke his neck in a crash at the Olympics last week is considering a return to the sport.

“It’s the easiest way to get healthy again,” Markus Schairer said on Friday about a possible comeback. “But it’s way too early to take that decision now.”

The 30-year-old Schairer underwent surgery on the fractured fifth vertebrae in his neck in an Austrian hospital on Monday, four days after he slammed into the snow on his back.