Japan Holds Off Korea 4-1 in Olympic Hockey

Japan has held off Korea 4-1 for its first Olympic victory in women's hockey, with Hanae Kubo and Shoko Ono each scoring in the first period.
Japan came into its third Olympics winless, but it has the ninth-ranked team in the world and is tops in Asia.

South Korea got a berth as host of the Pyeongchang Games and brought in six North Americans for their debut. The Koreans also had 12 North Koreans added to their expanded roster last month under an agreement between countries divided for seven decades.
Kubo scored 67 seconds in, and Ono added a power-play goal at 3:58.

The Koreans made more Olympic history of their own with their first goal at 9:31 of the second on their 33rd shot over three games.
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6:50 p.m.
Reigning Olympic champion Yuzuru Hanyu of Japan will be the first skater in the final group when the men take the ice for their short program at the Pyeongchang Games.

The starting draw was held after the pairs completed their short program Wednesday afternoon.

Hanyu will be followed Friday by American star Nathan Chen, Russian skater Mikhail Kolyada and countryman Shoma Uno. Two-time world champion Javier Fernandez of Spain will be the penultimate skater, with Boyang Jin of China going last.

Hanyu is trying to defend men's Olympic gold for the first time in 66 years. He did three jumps during practice Wednesday, hitting a quad toe-triple toe combination but falling on his quad salchow.

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6:45 p.m.
Defending champion Eric Frenzel of Germany has won the gold medal in the Nordic combined normal hill at the Pyeongchang Olympics.

Frenzel erased a 36-second deficit after the ski jumping stage and surged ahead of Akito Watabe on the last uphill of the 10-kilometer cross-country race to finish 4.8 seconds ahead of his Japanese rival. Austria's Lukas Klapfer took the bronze.

Austrian Franz-Josef Rehrl was the surprise winner of the ski jumping phase with a leap of 112 meters that gave him a 15-second head start but faded early in the cross-country stage.

Frenzel finished fifth in the ski jumping with a leap of 106.5 meters and took the lead midway through the race and held on to give Germany its sixth gold of the games.