Dave Hodge, interesting read on Olympics
Feb 19, 2002 23:45:12 GMT -5
Post by Cranky on Feb 19, 2002 23:45:12 GMT -5
Kind of a wishy-washy article but interersting.
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tsn.tsnmax.com/magazine/content/columns/
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By Dave Hodge, TSN
Dominant hockey nation, my foot. <br>
This collection of spoiled millionaires was supposed to dazzle the opposition at the Salt Lake City Olympics.
It would show the great offensive talent that is evident in everyday NHL play, and the hockey world expected that the national hero in charge was just the man to bring the team together and challenge for the gold medal.
So far, that hero has a lot to answer for, and there's no telling what the future holds for his country's international hockey ventures if his star-studded team goes home prematurely, with a lone, meaningless, narrow victory over a team that doesn't even belong in the final phase of the Olympic tournament.
To say the least, these are not fun times for Slava Fetisov. What? You didn't realize I was talking about the Russians? Who else, pray tell?
Well, okay, Canada has its' win over Germany to mirror the Russian triumph over Belarus, and Wayne Gretzky is to Canada as Fetisov is to Russia, so if you want to wring your hands and shake your head over Canada's performance, please do, but I was just about to explain Russia's history of playing possum in games that don't matter, and the games we've seen so far do not matter.
Maybe it's Canada's turn to prove that the time to win is when a loss sends you home, and not necessarily before.
Indeed, the bogus nature of this Olympic format becomes the beauty of the tournament for Canada, and team captain Mario Lemieux has been fond of recognizing that from the outset.
He has talked of being ready for the start of the tournament on Wednesday, February 20th. Games before that against Sweden, Germany and the Czech Republic weren't exactly called exhibition games, but they were never seen as detrimental to Canada's cause by their results as much as by Canada's performance in them, and though it's not quite the rallying cry the country would like, Canada has performed better each time out.
As the tournament proper gets set to begin, Canada prepares to meet Finland.
Where, in any pre-Olympic analysis, does it say that Canada would be in trouble if its quarterfinal opponent happened to be Finland?
Yes, the Finns finished ahead of the Russians fair and square by beating them 3-1, so surely it would be arrogant of Canada to think that its tie against the Czechs was preferable to a win that would have set up a meeting with Russia, but let's allow some Canadian arrogance for a change - who's quarrelling with the way this has turned out?
The Russians, I guess. And the Czechs. It will be particularly galling for the loser of that game to be eliminated at the same time as Germany and Belarus.
Those teams gum up the event by getting in as qualifiers to begin with, and they hardly need to be included in the quarterfinal draw. (Go ahead - flood me with reminders of Canada's 3-2 "slaughter" of Germany).
But seriously, this tournament would have been much better with only six teams at the beginning, or with six teams from this point on, or with only four teams left at this point.
In fact, we have witnessed 12 games in the past four days that are easy to forget already.
Canada has allowed itself to get bent like a pretzel because its' team hasn't looked good enough, and the Americans may be planning a gold-medal celebration, when the truth is, the only thing determined so far is that a repeat of the Nagano Olympic final between the Czech Republic and Russia is impossible.
Otherwise, the tournament can still unfold in any number of ways that have nothing to do with what has happened to this point. Have the games been a complete waste of time? No.
Some have been enjoyable to watch and the cultural exercise of considering international rules for the NHL is worthwhile.
The NHL is wondering, more than ever, about removing its' red-line offside, and it would do well to consider no-touch icing and some form of a quick face-off.
And we haven't even seen a shootout yet, but there's no evidence that the NHL would like to adopt hockey's most exciting innovation to eliminate regular season ties.
Above all, the Olympics could still be a dream come true for the NHL if there's a USA versus Canada final.
Stay tuned for that, or if you're just tuning in now, be happy to know that you haven't missed a thing and you might be as capable of predicting the winner as those of us who have tried (or not) to attach significance to what we've seen.
It might have been a weak excuse on Mario's part, but he was right when he said the tournament didn't start until the games really mattered. So if Canada was your choice a week ago, there's no reason to change now.
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tsn.tsnmax.com/magazine/content/columns/
------------------------------------------------------
By Dave Hodge, TSN
Dominant hockey nation, my foot. <br>
This collection of spoiled millionaires was supposed to dazzle the opposition at the Salt Lake City Olympics.
It would show the great offensive talent that is evident in everyday NHL play, and the hockey world expected that the national hero in charge was just the man to bring the team together and challenge for the gold medal.
So far, that hero has a lot to answer for, and there's no telling what the future holds for his country's international hockey ventures if his star-studded team goes home prematurely, with a lone, meaningless, narrow victory over a team that doesn't even belong in the final phase of the Olympic tournament.
To say the least, these are not fun times for Slava Fetisov. What? You didn't realize I was talking about the Russians? Who else, pray tell?
Well, okay, Canada has its' win over Germany to mirror the Russian triumph over Belarus, and Wayne Gretzky is to Canada as Fetisov is to Russia, so if you want to wring your hands and shake your head over Canada's performance, please do, but I was just about to explain Russia's history of playing possum in games that don't matter, and the games we've seen so far do not matter.
Maybe it's Canada's turn to prove that the time to win is when a loss sends you home, and not necessarily before.
Indeed, the bogus nature of this Olympic format becomes the beauty of the tournament for Canada, and team captain Mario Lemieux has been fond of recognizing that from the outset.
He has talked of being ready for the start of the tournament on Wednesday, February 20th. Games before that against Sweden, Germany and the Czech Republic weren't exactly called exhibition games, but they were never seen as detrimental to Canada's cause by their results as much as by Canada's performance in them, and though it's not quite the rallying cry the country would like, Canada has performed better each time out.
As the tournament proper gets set to begin, Canada prepares to meet Finland.
Where, in any pre-Olympic analysis, does it say that Canada would be in trouble if its quarterfinal opponent happened to be Finland?
Yes, the Finns finished ahead of the Russians fair and square by beating them 3-1, so surely it would be arrogant of Canada to think that its tie against the Czechs was preferable to a win that would have set up a meeting with Russia, but let's allow some Canadian arrogance for a change - who's quarrelling with the way this has turned out?
The Russians, I guess. And the Czechs. It will be particularly galling for the loser of that game to be eliminated at the same time as Germany and Belarus.
Those teams gum up the event by getting in as qualifiers to begin with, and they hardly need to be included in the quarterfinal draw. (Go ahead - flood me with reminders of Canada's 3-2 "slaughter" of Germany).
But seriously, this tournament would have been much better with only six teams at the beginning, or with six teams from this point on, or with only four teams left at this point.
In fact, we have witnessed 12 games in the past four days that are easy to forget already.
Canada has allowed itself to get bent like a pretzel because its' team hasn't looked good enough, and the Americans may be planning a gold-medal celebration, when the truth is, the only thing determined so far is that a repeat of the Nagano Olympic final between the Czech Republic and Russia is impossible.
Otherwise, the tournament can still unfold in any number of ways that have nothing to do with what has happened to this point. Have the games been a complete waste of time? No.
Some have been enjoyable to watch and the cultural exercise of considering international rules for the NHL is worthwhile.
The NHL is wondering, more than ever, about removing its' red-line offside, and it would do well to consider no-touch icing and some form of a quick face-off.
And we haven't even seen a shootout yet, but there's no evidence that the NHL would like to adopt hockey's most exciting innovation to eliminate regular season ties.
Above all, the Olympics could still be a dream come true for the NHL if there's a USA versus Canada final.
Stay tuned for that, or if you're just tuning in now, be happy to know that you haven't missed a thing and you might be as capable of predicting the winner as those of us who have tried (or not) to attach significance to what we've seen.
It might have been a weak excuse on Mario's part, but he was right when he said the tournament didn't start until the games really mattered. So if Canada was your choice a week ago, there's no reason to change now.