MILAN — At the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics, the U.S. women’s hockey team hasn’t yet run into an opponent that it hasn’t been able to overpower.

It was no different in Friday’s quarterfinals.

Eventually.

Leading Italy 1-0 after the first period despite taking 10 times as many shots, the U.S. got another point-blank shot a minute into the second period. Then another, seconds later. Both were saved, keeping an Italian team that had spent the previous week allowing more goals than it scored in a game against a U.S. team that had spent its own previous week quickly breaking opponents’ wills.

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Then, over the next 3:34, the U.S. illustrated why it will enter the semifinals as the gold-medal favorite. The U.S. scored three times to begin a rout that ended in a 6-0 U.S. victory.

Kendall Coyne Schofield scored twice. Four other teammates scored as well, including Megan Keller, whose first-period goal opened the scoring after 13 minutes. The U.S. had thoroughly controlled the possession without much breathing room to show for it.

Once Coyne scored less than two minutes into the second period to push the lead to 2-0, however, Italy’s underdog scrappiness fell apart within minutes. Coyne, Laila Edwards, Britta Curl and Hannah Bilka all scored to lead, 6-0.

The third goal by Edwards “kind of was the sigh of relief there,” said U.S. coach John Wroblewski.

“You knew there’d be energy in the building, but you didn’t know how much, and you knew there’d be energy from the other team, but you don’t know how much. You’ve never seen them before. That was the game in their lives. A lot of credit to the intensity of that team over there, and what a tournament for them. And the goalie was absolutely incredible.”

Once the game was no longer taut, it became testy.

Late in the second period, Bilka fell atop Italy’s goalkeeper after scoring, sparking an Italian player to defend their goalie. In turn, Bilka’s U.S. teammates came to defend her. Pushes, shoves and words flew in front of the Italian goal, while the coaches for each team began trading their own words and frustrations.

Yet the game was never close, which led to the question hanging over the rest of this tournament. Will any country be able to challenge the U.S.? The gold-medal game looms Feb. 19.

Eric Bouchard, who became Italy’s coach five months ago, said he was proud that Italy had held the U.S. to one goal in the first period and none in the third.

“The way we approached this game was basically we were facing the best team in the entire world, so they had no flaws,” Bouchard said. “I mean, they’re really good offensively, really good defensively. So we wanted to make sure we were controlling the middle of the ice. … try to keep them on the perimeters and get them under their skin.”

The teams the U.S. faces next will be deeper than Italy’s roster, Bouchard said.

“I think we’ve just showed (other teams) that anything is possible,” Bouchard said. “If you have a plan, you stick to it, and you help work. Anything is possible. It’s not a best-of-seven, it’s a one-shot game and the next teams that they’re going to be facing are going to be definitely more complete than our team. They’re gonna have lethal weapons defensively.”

Friday’s dominance was part of a pattern the U.S. has been building since the preliminary round, when it went undefeated. That included a thumping of Canada. They’ve outscored opponents 20-1. Their 4-0 record in group play left the U.S. 25-0-0-3 in the prelims all-time in its Olympic history. Including Friday’s win, the U.S. has gone 271 minutes since it last conceded a goal.

Canada, which lost to the U.S. without injured star Marie-Philip Poulin, remains the United States’ chief competition for the gold medal; the two nations have combined to win every gold medal since women’s hockey started at the Olympics in 1998.

Yet the 5-0 U.S. win was also its seventh straight against Canada.

Teams are re-seeded after the quarterfinals at the Olympics, meaning the U.S. won’t know its semifinal opponent until the quarterfinals finish Saturday.

“These one-game sets are volatile” in the knockout round, Wroblewski said. “… We’re nowhere near done.”

Part of the U.S. dominance to this point has stemmed from the roster’s familiarity with one another. Four players played in the 2014 Olympics; six were on the 2018 Olympic team that won gold; and 11 played in 2022.

The longest-tenured is captain Hilary Knight, playing her fifth and final Olympics. By the third period Friday, the only suspense left was whether she would enter the U.S. record books. Knight needs one more goal to have the most by any U.S. player in their Olympic career. Knight is also one point from breaking Jenny Potter’s U.S. career record for most points at the Olympics.

Knight did not register a point or goal on Friday, but the U.S. victory guaranteed her two more games in which to try.