Canada’s defeat at the Olympics leads to some uncomfortable questions and reignites debate about hockey’s ultimate prize, says columnist<\/p>\n
Fresh off the finishing touches to a mirthful piece for this space \u2014 lacking only the numeric margin of Team Canada\u2019s victory \u2014 I headed off to bed Saturday night eagerly anticipating Sunday morning\u2019s gold medal hockey game.<\/p>\n
I\u2019d had a few beers while re-watching Team USA\u2019s semi-final win versus Slovakia, envisioning the Milano ice surface strewn with American sentries in the aftermath of Tom Wilson\u2019s bunker-buster hits. Belligerently, I shouted \u201cHey, Charlie McAvoy, how\u2019s that for a scrum?!\u201d<\/p>\n
So stressed was I during Friday\u2019s semis, I consciously came to terms with a Sweden-Finland final, quite content to have Canada bash the U.S. for bronze. After all, those Scandinavians (I’ve been married to a Finn 40 years ) are industrious, amicable, and, hard-working chaps.<\/p>\n
To this, I chuckled audibly, recalling a Flintstones episode with a pair of Swedes introducing themselves to Fred, \u201cI am Sven, he is Ollie,\u201d as I added good-naturedly, \u201cYo, I am Mikko, so is he,\u201d the Finlander\u2019s response.<\/p>\n
Clearly, I was wound tight, fretting through the Olympics\u2019 two-week duration, though more accurately, since the fireworks of last February\u2019s 4 Nations Face-Off. Team Canada versus Team U.S.A. was a hockey game that just had to be played.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
At noon on Sunday, I was mildly hungover and miserably depressed. While the echo of the exuberant \u201cA-R-D! A-R-D!\u201d chants for Canadian women\u2019s netminder, Ann-Renee Desbiens, had faded, Canadian men\u2019s coach\u00a0Jon Cooper\u2019s \u201cdiscussion in the room that this not be Sid\u2019s last game,\u201d has not.<\/p>\n
Two gold medal losses, both at hockey, each to the U.S.<\/p>\n
No matter.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s our game! We\u2019re the best at it!.<\/p>\n
Right?<\/p>\n
While I found that edit-oriented \u201cDELETE\u201d key to be bluntly efficient, how that auto-correct from \u201ccolour\u201d and \u201cfavour,\u201d to the Americans’\u00a0\u201ccolor\u201d and \u201cfavor,\u201d did rankle.<\/p>\n
For 35 years I had been clinging to the notion that the Stanley Cup \u2014 no international tourney of any ilk \u2014 was this sport\u2019s penultimate prize. My grip firmed during our victory in the \u201991 Canada Cup, when, moments after being named tournament MVP, with microphones thrust in his still sweat-streaming face, Canadian netminder, Bill Ranford, stated matter-of-factly, \u201cIt\u2019s not the Stanley Cup, but, \u2026\u201d decisively ending any debate.<\/p>\n
Now, that quandary \u2014 Is an Olympic championship now hockey\u2019s gold standard? \u2014 has arisen once again, albeit from the perspective of another millennium,<\/p>\n
The calibre of the Milano Olympics hockey was sensational, indeed. With pucks pinging and zing-singing off the goalposts, like cowboys\u2019 bullets off rocks, in any good western, I wondered whether they were wider in International Ice Hockey Federation rules, and, was it just me, or were there no whistles? Such was the high-flying, amped-up pace of the play, with tension dialed doubly due to that excruciating, one-and-done format.<\/p>\n
However great the games were, I do have a quarrel with the rampant claims of \u201cthe greatest ever played!\u201d<\/p>\n
Consider how awful was Team Canada\u2019s opening shift. Had this bout been a boxing match, Canada\u2019s top trio of Connor McDavid between Nathan Mackinnon and Macklin Celebrini, would\u2019ve been mandated a standing-eight.<\/p>\n
The 42-28 shots on goal, favoured Canada, but flattered us more. At five-on-five, the Americans were plainly better, exiting their zone effectively via short, crisp passes interchanged within tightly-triangled, forward-moving troikas.<\/p>\n
Conversely, too many of Canada\u2019s breakouts seemed predicated on flip passes high up the middle, alley-oops, and hail Marys to boot. Furthermore, what of the dozen bobbled pucks, flubbed passes, and mis-fired shots? Even stalwart Cale Makar seemed bewildered.<\/p>\n
Peculiar was the frequency of Team U.S.A.\u2019s icings, though firm was their faith in their defence, in their goalie, Connor Hellebuyck, and especially in their face-off proficiency. These icings were neither rooted in fatigue nor desperation, proving tactically sound, allowing the game clock to be run down.<\/p>\n
True enough, Hellebuyck was stellar, but, Canada\u2019s Devon Toews and MacKinnon both missed wide-yawning, open nets. Less consequential, yet somehow more outrageous, was that blatantly missed, too-many-men, penalty call. May the vetting of referees for France 2030, demand a demonstrable command of counting to six.<\/p>\n
Beyond the prairie fire of despair, blazing across the land, there\u2019s sure to be dozens of dissections and diatribes, amidst autopsies and analytics.<\/p>\n
Alas, such critiques and questions may reveal stands of trees rooted in a worrisome angst that mask the forest of Canada\u2019s waning hockey supremacy. It\u2019s been hemorrhaging for years, with infrequent contests like these Olympics to confirm it. Keep in mind, false was the assurance garnered from Canada\u2019s 4 Nations win. The prevailing sentiment there was not victory, but, flat-out relief.<\/p>\n
Underpinning all of this is simply not just the vast disparity in our populations, but, in conjunction with Americans\u2019 participation in the sport soaring, while in Canada sign-ups are sagging, it\u2019s altogether telling. World Junior Hockey championships are leading indicators of Olympic success; the Americans have won gold in three of the past five tournaments.<\/p>\n
Uncomfortable factors.<\/p>\n
Were Sunday\u2019s matchup just the first game of a best-of-seven series \u2014 the understood standard of measure for which team\u2019s best \u2014 emotions aside, in a high-stakes bet, where lies your wager?<\/p>\n
While one winces, one might wonder, is Jack Eichel \u2014 10 years removed from being drafted a distant second to the more highly-skilled Connor McDavid \u2014 now, the better hockey player? No, but suddenly it\u2019s not entirely an unreasonable supposition. And now wallowing, mightn\u2019t Jordan Binnington have handled Jack Hughes\u2019 overtime shot?<\/p>\n
Global warming is not the culprit; Canada\u2019s backyard rinks are not melting, it\u2019s just that too many of them lie quiet and empty. No matter, do not some of today\u2019s best players hail from America\u2019s southwest desert, with fewer from Vermillion Bay and Val d\u2019Or? Is any of Michigan, Massachusetts, or maybe Minnesota, the new Kirkland Lake?<\/p>\n
Uncomfortable questions.<\/p>\n
The painting pictured above \u2014 Hockey on the Exploits River, Newfoundland, circa 1945 \u2014 is nostalgic and quaint, but, unfortunately, applicable today, it ain\u2019t.<\/p>\n
A quotation attributed to Brooklyn-born, legendary Green Bay Packers coach, Vince Lombardi: \u201cIt is hard to shake off a suspicion that our national preoccupation with winning leads to many excesses.\u201d Among many more, and, much greater concerns, images of U.S. women\u2019s hockey player, Abbey \u2018Drop-Quick\u2019 Murphy\u2019s antics, do come to mind.<\/p>\n
Tariffs and tirades \u2026 economic upheaval; nations\u2019 sovereignties threatened; Venezuela; Greenland; Iran; \u201cI.C.E\u201d breaching the St. Lawrence; and, that matter of the 51st state.<\/p>\n
Anyone still comfortable with being uncomfortable?<\/p>\n
Olympic hockey players have forever been draped in capes replicating their homeland\u2019s colours, but, only now have they completely crystallized into nation states\u2019 flags, just as the distinction between opponent and enemy has now blurred.<\/p>\n
Just a hockey game?<\/p>\n
In some manner \u2026 maybe, but, in all, no way.<\/p>\n