One of the great things about Olympic hockey is that you get to root for players you'd normally jeer. It often gives you a new appreciation for a once-villain and can even make you empathize with rival fans (Crosby? Why? Whyyyyyyy?).
With that in mind, there are some players whom I'll have a lot of trouble rooting against after the United States' Cinderella run to the silver medal. Here's a list of some players who I'll be rooting for individually, even when they're playing against the Penguins.
(And, for fun, a few players from other countries who really caught my eye)
US players who are now (temporarily) bulletproof:
Ryan Miller - well, obviously. Miller was great in this tournament (a bit shaky at times in the gold medal game but made some huge saves when it mattered). I've been a fan of Miller's for quite some time and he's made a serious case for "best goalie alive" status. Either way, he was amazingly poised and kept the US in some tough games.
Brian Rafalski - despite being a member of the Detroit Red Wings, it's going to be hard to hate on Rafalski for a while. He was by far the steadiest influence on the red-white-and-blue line and also had an amazing performance in the first Canada-US game. I thought he had lost a step recently, but he was great during the Olympics.
Ryan Callahan/David Backes - those two threw their bodies around with reckless abandon. Respect.
Chris Drury - while his contract is still absurdly bloated, Drury was a shot blocking machine in the Olympics. It's hard not to like a player who puts his body on the line like that.
Zach Parise - even before he scored that amazing last-minute goal against Canada, Parise was easily one of the best forwards for the US. Maybe he's not really an American, but we'll take him.
David Backes is a bad ass.
Patrick Kane - he didn't have a very consistent tournament, but man oh man did he play a great game today. Kane is simply a delight to watch and is one of the league's slickest stick handlers. Parise scored that game-tying goal, but Kane made a bunch of big plays in that sequence. The kid is special.
Ryan Kesler - his amazing empty net goal was the cherry on top of a gritty, high-IQ Olympics sundae. I have a serious Kesler man-crush.
Not quites:
The Johnsons - Erik and Jack (no relation) had some great moments but also made some huge blunders. I'm particularly smitten by Erik, but he still has a ways to go before he meets #1 pick expectations. He certainly has the physical tools to do that, though.
Joe Pavelski - I don't think he had a "standout" tournament, but I still have a ton of respect for Pavelski.
Stinkers:
Phil Kessel - while Kessel can skate like the wind, he's a turnover machine who could probably benefit from making more "simple" plays. Just about every time he had the puck, I expected either a) nothing to happen or b) something bad to happen. Boston might have made the right choice, even if there will be some short term pain.
Ryan Whitney - he wasn't god awful but he made his trademark horrible turnovers. I'm probably, at times, a bit hard on Whitney but still. I can't help but think he sucks.
Other countries (good):
Shea Weber - is a man. That guy really can do it all. He really worked over Alex Ovechkin, which doesn't happen very often. Even if he didn't shoot through a net he'd still be a monster, but that was his "Larry Robinson checks someone hard enough to dent the boards" moment. What a beast.
Jonas Hiller - already was "on my radar" after his amazing performance against the Sharks in last year's playoffs. He was even better in this tournament and was the only reason the Swiss gave the US and Canada serious headaches. The Ducks have to feel pretty good about Hiller being their future in net after seeing how well he handled such pressure.
Mark Streit - quite possibly the most underrated defenseman in the NHL.
Pavol Demitra - although he missed two golden opportunities to tie Slovakia's semi-final match with Canada, Demitra seemed revitalized in these playoffs. Perhaps Demitra can get healthy enough to be a productive NHL player again?
Other countries (bad):
Team Russia - really stunk up the joint and didn't help matters by blowing off the media. As an at-the-moment nonpracticing journalist, the interview snubs don't bother me personally but those actions indicate a lack of maturity. Really, the team paid for being arrogant enough to think that their star power could push a KHL-heavy roster through the best teams in the world.
It wasn't one player's fault and almost no one played well. So much for Russia being a hockey juggernaut.
Kipper- sure, Finland won the bronze, but Kipper's meltdown against the US team was very telling. You think he'll be able to demand a starter's role in 2014?
Sweden - wow, did Sweden get old all of a sudden? It's still stunning that Lidstrom was shut out of the playoffs and the team didn't even make it to the semi-finals. Russia got the most heat for crapping out of the Olympics, but Sweden was pretty underwhelming themselves.
Final thoughts:
He might not have lit up the scoreboard, but Sidney Crosby sure received a lot of criticism on Twitter (Twittercism?) after scoring a gold medal winning goal. No doubt about it, he receives too much attention but what else can he do on the ice to justify the hype? He's 22 years old and already has a gold medal, Cup, scoring title and Hart trophy on his resume. What else does he have to do before people say, "it's annoying that he gets so much attention, but he is really good."
Alex Ovechkin had a tough Olympics, but he had his fair share of high points (clobbering Jaromir Jagr and Zdeno Chara, in particular).
Maybe Ovechkin and Crosby putting up "human" numbers might indicate that, you know, there are a lot of other great hockey players in the NHL. Just compare the talented Olympic teams to Olympic basketball and you'll see that hockey talent is wonderfully spread across the globe.
Some people get so caught up in homer behavior (either for their NHL team, national team or both) when this tournament should be a celebration of all things hockey. Sometimes, you need to just enjoy the sport and get over your puck prejudices.
Not a particularly graceful two weeks for the Fawned Over One, Alex Ovechkin.
Perhaps Sidney Crosby has a Cup because he does what Ovechkin doesn't want to do (play defense, acknowledge pressure) and gets all that media attention because he does what Ovechkin doesn't feel like doing (will always give a bland but accessible interview, even when his feewings are hurt.)
(All that being said, the Olympics gave me a chance to appreciate Ovechkin's game a bit more. I don't hate Ovechkin, I just find it amusing that the hockey blogosphere/Twitteverse is a bizarro mainstream media. In that niche atmosphere, Crosby's a prick and Ovechkin can do no wrong. The truth is usually somewhere in between.)
Is it me, or have a lot of once-proud national teams gotten old?
Sweden bowed out of the Olympics without even coming within a breath of a medal and all-world D Nicklas Lidstrom went pointless. Despite being scrappy and featuring nice goaltending from Tomas Vokoun, the Czech Republic is no longer an elite team. With Teemu Selanne and Saku Koivu getting long in the tooth, it's obvious that Finland will look very different (if pros even go to the Olympics) in 2014.
You can go on and on about "experience" but I'll take young legs every time. Of course, it helps to have competent management, a solid goalie and a decent defensive system (Russian fans are squirming in their seats a bit right now).
Maybe it's just that I know more about hockey than I did a few years ago, but am I wrong in thinking that this Olympics feature an amazing assortment of goalies?
I don't mean the cream of the crop, as Ryan Miller cannot yet claim superiority over the Patrick Roys and Dominik Haseks of the world. Instead, I mean that a larger chunk of the teams feature a genuine franchise goalie.
Here's a snapshot of some of the stronger goalies:
USA - Miller, Tim Thomas
Canada - Martin Brodeur (people really need to calm down about one bad game), Roberto Luongo
Sweden - Henrik Lundqvist (in my mind, a top-5 goalie in the NHL)
Czech Republic - Vokoun (wildly underrated)
Slovakia - Jaroslav Halak (very solid)
Switzerland - Jonas Hiller (quite possibly the second best goalie of the tournament behind Miller)
Finland - Kipper (though he's been up-and-down) and Backstrom (possibly more deserving?)
Russia - Nabokov (was hung out to dry but did genuinely struggle) and Bryz (another very solid goalie)
At this point, only the true underdogs lack a good NHL goalie (Germany's Greiss is a borderline pro at best). Perhaps that's why supposed juggernauts have struggled so much?
There has been a lot of discussion about women’s ice hockey lately. The United States will meet Canada to play for the gold medal – again – on Thursday, and it was pretty much a foregone conclusion that they’d be playing each other for the gold from the beginning. For both teams, their opponents appeared to be nothing more than speed bumps on the way to this game.
Scores like 18-0, 13-0, 12-1 were common for those two national teams, and many people have been questioning whether women’s ice hockey should be an Olympic event because of the lack of suitable competition. So let me explain women’s hockey. I used to play, so I know how this goes.
First off, there’s a very good reason why the US and Canada have easily out-played their competition. Canada has had a women’s hockey program in place since at least the 1980s. The US has had a women’s hockey program for probably about as long and both countries have had girls playing on boys teams for a lot longer than that.
The very first international women’s hockey tournament was held in 1990. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided in 1992 to make women’s ice hockey a gold medal event at the 1998 Olympics in Nagano, Japan. Only six countries participated in that first Olympics for the sport in 1998: The US (gold), Canada (silver), Finland (bronze), China, Sweden, and the host country, Japan. So women’s hockey is a relatively young sport.
Smile like the Lamoureuxs
The real problem with women’s hockey is that the women’s programs for most of the other participating nations are at least a good 10 years behind the US and Canada. I would guess that most countries got their programs going right after the IOC’s announcement in 1992. Sweden and Finland, despite being blown out by the US and Canada in this Olympics, have become pretty competitive. The rest of the field is still catching up, however. Give it another ten years and you’ll probably see the level of international competition jump up significantly.
Women’s hockey is different than the men’s. There’s no getting around that. The rules are pretty much the same with two significant exceptions.
The first is that women’s hockey players are required to wear full face protection. Most wear metal wire cages, but some wear the clear plastic shields. It used to be that neck guards were required as well, but I believe that’s optional at the senior level now.
The biggest difference between men’s and women’s hockey is that body checking is a penalty for the women. Now don’t get that wrong – the woman’s game is still very physical. But lining someone up and checking them into the boards and open ice hits are penalties.
Women do know how to body check and they would very much like to be able to. But at this time, it’s against the rules. The reason for it, from what I was told when I played, is that a woman could get a stick end in the lower abdomen and be injured so that she may not be able to have children because of that. The same thing goes with the men, of course, but it’s the women that actually have the babies – that’s the difference. There is additional padding that is required for women to wear to cover their lower abdomens, but that apparently doesn’t make any difference to the rule makers.
Babies are to blame for, like, everything really.
See, this is what happens when old men make the rules for a women’s sport, and it drives us women nuts. We’d very much like to play hockey as the men do, and we all consider that to be “real” hockey, but we’re not allowed simply because we are able to bear children.
Sadly, hockey isn’t the only sport infected with this wrong-headed kind of thinking.
The reason that women know how to body check is because women’s teams play boys teams when there aren’t any other women’s teams around. While in women’s hockey checking isn’t allowed, in mixed games it is – or it can be. Women’s teams will play high school aged boys teams for competition. Before the game, each team will vote on whether to include checking or not. Then the coaches and officials meet, and they give the team’s decisions. And checking is almost always allowed. Women will take any chance they can to play “real” hockey, and teenage boys won’t pass up the opportunity to body check women if it’s legal.
In the younger age brackets, girls will play on the same teams as boys. And, if there aren’t enough girls to form a team in an area, then they’ll make allowances to girls to play with the boys into the teen years. Very occasionally, a girl will play with high school aged boys, especially if she’s good enough. As the girl gets older, however, the ones that are able to play with the boys the longest are the goaltenders.
Manon Rheaume, the only woman to ever play in the NHL (albeit briefly)
Girls who play as defensemen and forwards aren’t usually able to keep up with the boys after a while. And there’s a good read for that: it’s called biology. It has nothing to do with height and weight – though that does become a consideration for many – so much as speed.
The women’s game is a little slower than the men’s game. It’s about on pace with high school boys hockey, so it’s not as if it’s really slow. Most of the women who play in the Olympics for the US are college hockey players, and female collegiate athletes are typically very good and pretty fast.
The speed problem comes from physiology. Men’s legs are right underneath them; their knees usually line up with their hip sockets when they stand with their feet shoulder’s width apart. So their thighbones go from hip to knee in a fairly straight line, and that gives them a very efficient skating stride.
Women, because we bear children, aren’t built like that. When we stand with our feet shoulder’s length apart, our knees line up inside our hip sockets. Our thigh bones come into our knees at an angle – not straight above like the men’s thighbones do. This is why women have far more knee problems than men do, as a general rule, but it also makes our skating strides less efficient and therefore makes us not as quick as the men.
It really is the same sport, however, despite its differences. And, in actuality, the differences aren’t that great. Some people enjoy the women’s game more because there isn’t any checking, because that’s seen as creating a better flow to the game. But until there is more competition for the US and Canada – and there will be, you just have to be patient – these blowouts are just not entertaining.
However, before you make any judgment about women’s ice hockey, watch the gold medal game between the US and Canada on Thursday. That will be as competitive and as physical game as you could possibly ask for. And, you might be surprised by how much you like it.
I've kind of taken a hiatus from blogging during the games, because other than what's going on up in Vancouver there's not much to talk about. I've poked and prodded teh interwebz, and here's what I've found:
The Preds might have a name for their arena, one hopefully that won't skip out on financial obligations to the team or the city. Bridgstone Arena sounds a lot cooler than Sommet Center, which I always felt was a tad too "French Surrender Monkey" for a hockey team. They also have a pretty cool profile on Patrik Hornqvist over there... never realized that he was chosen last for kickball in 2005.
The HuffPo is picking up hockey news now? Nice writeup on the new Blackhawks phenomenon I'm trying to comb the recessess of my mind to think of a good "liberals/hockey/political turncoat" joke here, and it's just not happening. I'm disappointed in myself.
You're going to the Game Time Prospect Department every Sunday for your young guns updates, right? RIGHT? No? And just why not? Hockey's Future has got nuttin on B-ri over at Game Time.
Nightmare on Helm Street breaks down the riviting NHL.com Rafalski interview. Quick question - do the same guys who write the headlines on the main page come up with the questions for the interviews? Because if that's a yes... that explains a lot.
Lastly, I would love to insert a Blue Jackets link in here somewhere, but apparently none of the blogs are actually posting anything anymore. Um... your team's still there, right? Some dude named Nash is in the Olympics, isn't he?
So I've been saturating the Twitterverse with my unwelcomed commentary since Men's Olympic Hockey began on Tuesday and soaked in a lot of the trends in the process. Some are traditional bits of Twitter snark carrying over to the Olympics (see: Crosby, Sidney) while other jokes are only going to be cracked out during these two weeks (better use your best WWII references fast!).
Now, keep in mind I'm guilty of a ton of these. That doesn't mean I'll hesitate to make fun of myself and everyone else. Feel free to keep a scorecard and if you get 5-across go ahead and treat yourself to 5 monopoly bucks. No free spaces, because those are weaker than the fact that there's no checking in women's hockey.
ANYWAY, feel free to leave your own suggestions for better bingo pieces in the comments. Leave your grandma at home, though, please. Click on the image to check it out.
Hockey fans have learned to hate NBC and generally piss poor coverage of the game for years now. Many of us will never forget the Peacock's decision to move an intense Sabres-Senators playoff game to Versus in order to run the pre-show for a horse race. Even if you argue that the racing preview might affect gambling decisions (and therefore could be highly rated relatively speaking), it's not that far from saying that professional bowling out-rated hockey. (Which ... ugh, actually happened.)
Still, with all the problems NBC and Vancouver are having in the 2010 Winter Olympics, you'd think that they would have some backup plans if certain events took longer than expected. Especially considering the fact that the Network has its MSNBC, CNBC and USA affiliates at their disposal.
Yet when the hockey world clamored to see what home team (and gold medal favorite) Canada would do in front of a partisan crowd, CNBC audience members were treated to ...
Curling! Hey oh!
Needless to say, I was among the masses who were stunned by the company's befuddled reaction. It took the Powers That Be nearly half the first period to switch from a women's hockey blowout to this game and they did so without any clear message for hockey fans to switch over. Then, they casually switched back during a commercial break with only a mention from Doc Emmerick. No on-screen graphic.
Here's a collection of some angry puck reactions. Some from Twitter, some from blogs. Feel free to e-mail me at cyclelikesedins[at]gmail.com if you have reactions to the brief clusterfuck (this list will be updated a few times):
The pro wrestling/Photoshop lovers at Pensblog created a creative Olympic Hockey fantasy game at Rinkotology. You have until 3:00 pm ET to get your team in and go for one of the 5 prizes. It costs $10 to join, but I think it's worth the rooting interest. Besides, not everyone can afford putting such services up for free when they're not some Internet hippo like Yahoo!, right?
At first I thought I should try to keep my team secret, but then I realized that would be petty and silly. Really, if you want to steal some of my ideas go for it.
Here's my team. I'll have an explanation for choices in a bit, but I wanted to get this up to give people a chance to join.
(Click the image to enlarge)
Evaluating my team
So, the catch with Rinktology is that you have to choose one player from every country. You are allowed 8 forwards, 3 defensemen and one goalie.
The first step, for me, was to narrow down the best choices from the underdog nations.
Swiss defenseman Mark Streit is the easiest choice of all and I'd be surprised if any "hockey people" left him out. Perhaps someone thinks that Jonas Hiller will lead a crazy Cinderella run, but I'm more comfortable with the rarity of a high scoring Swiss D.
One of the biggest decisions was picking a goalie.
I think that Canada is going to take the gold medal, but I was weary of choosing between Roberto Luongo and Martin Brodeur. Russia is obviously the other big favorite for the gold, but I'm not a huge fan of their defense (and naturally want to have a certain Russian forward on my team anyway).
While I'm a fan of Ryan Miller, I'm more than a little worried about the US defense.
So considering these factors (Canada and Russia's forwards are too great to pass up but you want to go after a goalie on a strong contender), the decision came down to Henrik Lundqvist or Tomas Vokoun.
Ultimately, I wanted Nicklas Lidstrom on my blue line more than any Czech player in any other position. It also is fair to say that I have a bit of a hockey dork crush on Vokoun, so I figured why the hell not?
Crosby, Ovechkin and Hossa were probably the easiest decisions to make. I might make a last minute change from Patrick Kane to Zach Parise, but I'm definitely happy to root for a likable American forward either way.
Toughest omissions:
Lundqvist: I might change my mind at the last minute and make him my goalie
Jaromir Jagr: my man-crush on Jagr is almost unlimited.
Henrik Zetterberg: I've always been a big fan of his, and really, defensemen are never as valuable as forwards in these things. Still, the lure of Lidstrom was too strong.
Chicago Blackhawks forward and apparent American Olympic savior Patrick Kane is saying that the USA is there for nothing less than solid gold. If you say otherwise, he'll start yelling "Do you know who I am???" at you while an older, bigger player (possibly Jamie Langenbrunner) beats you up.
SB Nation's tag team of arena newspapers, Second City Hockey and St. Louis Game Time, preview the Olympics. One has a slightly, uh... more hostile viewpoint.
Simply put, I couldn't find a simple and clean men's-only hockey schedule so I asked around and put this together. You can find a full schedule in various spots and surely there are similar things like this out there but I couldn't find one immediately. Big thanks to Steve Lepore, Cassie and Tapeleg who sent some schedule link help on Twitter. This list was edited from a Puck the Media post.
Date in bold, then the format is time, match and (network). This will mark the first time since I watched pro wrestling that I'll watch something on USA! Where IS USA network anyway? Oh, so much to learn ...
Edit: All times are ET (Eastern Standard Time)
Feb. 16
3:00 USA vs. Switzerland (USA)
8:00 Canada vs. Norway (CNBC)
12:30 AM Russia vs. Latvia (CNBC)
Feb. 17
3:00 Finland vs. Belarus (MSNBC)
8:00 Sweden vs. Germany (CNBC)
12:30 Czech Republic vs. Slovakia (CNBC)
Feb. 18
3:00 USA vs. Norway (USA)
8:00 Canada vs. Switzerland (CNBC)
12:30 Russia vs. Slovakia (CNBC)
Feb. 19
3:00 Sweden vs. Belarus (MSNBC)
8:00 Czech Republic vs. Latvia (CNBC)
12:00 Finland vs. Germany (MSNBC)
Feb. 20
3:00 Norway vs. Switzerland (MSNBC)
7:30 Slovakia vs. Latvia (MSNBC)
12:00 Belarus vs. Germany (MSNBC)
Feb. 21
3:00 Czech Republic vs. Russia (NBC)
7:00 Canada vs. USA (MSNBC)
12:00 Sweden vs. Finland (MSNBC)
Feb. 23
3:00 Secondary Round Action (Potential Team USA Game) (USA)
8:00 Secondary Round Action (CNBC)
10:00 Secondary Round Action (CNBC)
12:30 Secondary Round Action (CNBC)
Feb. 24
3:00 Team USA Quarterfinal (NBC)
7:00 Team Canada Quarterfinal (MSNBC)
10:00 Quarterfinal(CNBC)
12:30 Quarterfinal (CNBC)
Feb. 26
3:00 Team USA Semifinal (NBC, Likely Moved if Team USA not involved)
To the surprise of few, the Columbus Blue Jackets recently fired coach Ken Hitchcock. You've probably read all about it, but the basic problem was that (much like fellow Central Division ex-coach Andy Murray) Hitch managed to lead the BJ's to an unexpected playoff berth last season only to see the bottom fall out this year.
People blamed Steve Mason's disturbing sophomore slump or assumed that Hitch simply cannot adapt to the post-lockout NHL.
Frankly, I think that's hogwash. Hitchcock has been a success with three different franchises (a Cup in Dallas, making the Eastern Conference Finals with Philadelphia and leading hapless Columbus to its first-ever playoff berth) even if his teams rarely lead the league in thrills and exclamation points.
I think Hitchcock was the easy scapegoat as is often the case in the NHL. Horrible GMs such as Glen Sather and Don Waddell keep polluting the on-ice product while competent coaches get canned. However I feel about the decision, the plain truth is that both Hitch and I have one thing in common at the moment: unemployment.
With that in mind, these are the teams that I believe would benefit greatly (and could realistically make a move) to add Hitchcock.
Bloguin is the revolutionary blog network specifically focused on helping bloggers get the most out of their websites. We're currently working on building a large network of online communities and hope to expand our blogging coverage to include a wide range of topics.
Advertisers
The Bloguin Network allows advertisers to promote their products and services to our ever-growing number of visitors. We offer both site-specific ad placements as well as the ability to run a network-wide campaign. If you're interested in working with Bloguin to meet your advertising needs, please contact us.
Bloggers Wanted
The Bloguin Network is always looking to expand. We're specifically looking for blogs in the sports, entertainment, and video games field, but are open to adding any type of quality site. If you're a blogger and interested in joining our network, please fill out our application form.
The Bloguin Login
The Bloguin Login gives you full access to everything our network has to offer. Your name and password will work for each and every one of our sites. Signing up is simple, and will allow you to post in all our forums, create member blogs, and access other cool features! What are you waiting for? Create an Account!
Bloguin is the revolutionary blog network specifically focused on helping bloggers get the most out of their websites. We're currently working on building a large network of online communities and hope to expand our blogging coverage to include a wide range of topics. 
The Bloguin Network allows advertisers to promote their products and services to our ever-growing number of visitors. We offer both site-specific ad placements as well as the ability to run a network-wide campaign. If you're interested in working with Bloguin to meet your advertising needs, please contact us.
The Bloguin Network is always looking to expand. We're specifically looking for blogs in the sports, entertainment, and video games field, but are open to adding any type of quality site. If you're a blogger and interested in joining our network, please fill out our application form.
The Bloguin Login gives you full access to everything our network has to offer. Your name and password will work for each and every one of our sites. Signing up is simple, and will allow you to post in all our forums, create member blogs, and access other cool features! What are you waiting for? Create an Account! 