2010 Olympic Hockey: The (t5!) Wrap-Up

 

I’m aware that I still have tons to finish with regards to my Heroes Of The Zeroes posts; there are still fourteen singles to go, a list of albums to discuss, so on and so forth. But last weekend, we just witnessed what people are hyperbolizing as the greatest hockey game ever, the championship game of what people are hyperbolizing as the greatest international tournament ever. We can’t let it pass without some sort of two cents. It’s not (t5!)’s style, not anymore at least.

It may not be the greatest hockey game ever and I don’t know even know where it ranks, nor do I have the encyclopedia of hockey games in my head to even start ordering in some kind of list (ESPN addressed this enumeration in a 2002 article). However, it was very very good, and a fitting end to a very, very good Winter Olympics. I was fidgety prior to the game and I knew 90 to 95 percent of the country was experiencing the same feeling. When Team Canada scored two go-ahead goals, it was one of the most exhilarating highs I’ve experienced as both a sports fan and a Canadian. Conversely, when Team America (fuck yeah!) tied it up with seconds left, it was definite nadir. I wasn’t around when Mario Lemieux scored the overtime goal during the 1987 Canada Cup Finals, so I can’t compare the weight of that goal with this game-winner. But, hot damn, that goal we saw last Sunday was the biggest overtime goal of my hockey-watching lifetime, narrowly beating Edmonton’s Fernando Pisani’s Game Five OT goal during the 2006 Stanley Cup Finals against Carolina.

Sidney Crosby, the one who scored the OT goal, couldn’t have been happier, as seen in that picture above. Surely, it’s because he won it for his home country, but a chunk of it is because he added another chapter to his already blossoming legacy as “The Next One”. Certainly, it made people forget that he hasn’t registered a point in the two elimination games prior to that gold medal game and he tallied most of his points when the games were already out of reach. We also witnessed him be fancy with the puck and be willing to pass off chances to more experienced players when the correct decision was to shoot. However, people will remember him as the star of the tournament because he scored two of the most important goals for Canada: this overtime goal and the shootout winner against Switzerland. Without question, you can call it clutch, but if Patrice Bergeron scored that game-winner, would we be calling him The Next One? I don’t think so.

But poor U.S.A., right? They had to play the unfamiliar role of underdogs in this gold medal game, even though they already beat us during the round robins (I’m not part of the team, of course, but I’m using the pronoun “us” here because like what the beer commercial states “I AM CANADIAN”). But, it’s true, though; they had no business being there, ranking sixth before the tournament, so a silver medal performance is nothing to be ashamed of. The truth of the matter is that this game meant way more to Canadians than to Americans, WAY MORE, capitalizing these words doesn’t even properly express how much more important this is to us. The citizens of the States are properly disappointed now because of that loss, but they’ll get over it. If we lost that game, especially if we lost it in overtime after having the lead with seconds to go, can you imagine the devastation we would’ve felt? We would’ve been depressed for months! I wouldn’t be surprised if they cancelled the closing ceremony afterwards if Canada lost that game.

But this is also a win for Team U.S.A. because they surprisingly had an exceptional backing. 27.6 million Americans tuned in to cheer for their team, making this the most watched hockey game ever in the States. That’s a 45.5% increase over the last time the two squads have met to determine who gets the gold (2002). The media is comparing this game to the “Miracle On Ice”, which is absolutely ridiculous because (1) U.S.A. wasn’t that much worse than Canada, unlike the 1980 Lake Placid team who consisted of college players going against The Soviet Union’s all-stars, and (2) there wasn’t a Cold War circumstance looming in the air. This was still an important game, however, the same reason why 1992 Dream Team was crucial to the development of international basketball. Kids will have aspirations to follow the footsteps of Zach Parise, Brian Rafalski, and Ryan Miller, and this will result in a better output of American born players a decade from now. In the 2022 Olympics, it wouldn’t be out of the question if they were the odds-on-favorite to win the gold medal.

This will go down as one of the finest teams Canada has assembled, even though it doesn’t hold a candle to that 1987 Canada Cup team that included Lemieux and Wayne Gretzky playing in the same line. Props to Steve Yzerman and his boys because they put together a tremendous team that performed and gelled together while the enormous pressure of playing in front of the host country weighed down on them. I was critical of some the roster choices, (Mike Richards and Jonathan Toews over internationally tested Martin St. Louis and Vincent Lecavalier, Drew Doughty over Mike Green) but even the choices I criticized ended up playing huge roles on the road to victory. They asked Russian goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov after they were trounced during the quarterfinals and he said they were “like gorillas coming out of a cage.”; a balanced assault of size and speed, athleticism and power, grit and savvy. But after all is said and done, Canada’s on top of the hockey world; the way it’s supposed to. Thanks, guys, it’s the first time I felt patriotic since I came back here.