Congratulations, dudes!  That was one hell of a game. Also:

The Canadian women’s hockey team took home gold yesterday, shutting out Team USA 2-0. And after winning it all, the girls cut loose on the ice – sparking fat cigars, cracking beers, and generally not giving a fuck.

Who do these Canadians think they are – Americans? Regardless, I’m feeling this – lookit that big-ass Molson! – but the stuffy old International Olympic Committee is hating. Fuck ‘em!

The Canadian women should tell the IOC to kiss their chunky gold medals, kinda like Scotty Lago did:

American Scotty Lago, who won a bronze in halfpipe, voluntarily left the games after a photo surfaced of a woman kneeling below his waist to kiss the medal.

Not mad!

Russia got knocked out like Ivan Drago in yesterday’s quarterfinal bout with Canada. Admittedly, that’s an imperfect analogy for a bunch of reasons: Balboa was of course wearing starred & striped shorts and not the maple leaf when he avenged Apollo Creed’s death in Rocky IV, Creed was famously introduced by James Brown and not Celine Dion, the cold war’s long over and Russia isn’t the CCCP, etc. But you get the idea. (I was gonna photoshop Doug McKenzie’s head onto Rocky in this picture, but thankfully lost momentum.)  Canada landed a Hollywood-style haymaker on Russia last night, winning hockey’s clash of the titans by the unlikely score of 7-3.

While a final score like that might indicate a compelling defensive showdown in the NFL, it’s comparatively boring in a hockey game. And as lopsided as it is, 7-3 somehow makes it sound like the contest was closer than it was. By the end of the first, Evgeni Nabokov had already been torched 4 times by the Canucks. A few minutes into the second, Canada had scored six times. For some bizarre reason, Russian coach Vyacheslav Bykov only chose to yank Nabokov at that point – with the score an unmerciful 6-1 – thus handing Ilya Bryzgalov an impossible mess. Unsurprisingly, Bryzgalov didn’t spark the miracle comeback, and after 60 minutes the mighty Russians had been felled. Coach Bykov has brought home back-to-back world championships, but this all-star squad seemed weirdly out-of-sync and sluggish for much of the tournament. So forget my last post when I said Russia was gold medal favorites; instead, just remember the part where I said you shouldn’t count the Canucks out. 

Team USA, meanwhile, won a quirky game against the Swiss that was far closer than their 3-1 meeting in the preliminary round. Ryan Miller notched his first shutout of the tournament, but the real story was Jonas Hiller in the opposing net. Hiller stopped 42, letting in just one from Zach Parise who also collected an empty-net tally in the closing minutes. The Americans will face the Finns tomorrow at noon pacific. The unfortunate start time means I will most likely contract an unexpected illness at around 2:30 PM EST and be forced to leave work, return home and self-medicate with beer.

Finally, the Slovaks proved they’re not fucking around by dispatching the Swedes, reigning Olympic champions, by a score of 4-3. Tomas Kopecky, pictured above, scored what proved to be the winning tally and the surprising Slovaks earned the right to battle the resurgent Canadians tomorrow evening. While a Slovak victory tomorrow would undoubtedly have to be called an upset, the team has plenty of talent: Gaborik, Chara, Halak, Demitra. But I think Canada’s on a mission, and I think the hosts will earn a trip to the gold medal game. Finns or Yanks? I can’t call it, but I’d love to see a USA-Canada rematch – I’m sure all of Canada would, too. Gotta admit tho: I’m kinda terrified of the prospect. Vengeful Canadians… fuck, man. Look out.

That giant sucking sound you hear from the north? That’s the sound of Canadian dreams deflating after tonight’s crushing loss to  their continental rivals, Team USA.

As a Buffalo Sabres loyalist, I’m well-acquainted with Ryan Miller’s mastery – and tonight, the rest of the country got to see what I’m lucky enough to watch game after game. As of about 10:30 PM EST, Miller’s name was the #2 trending topic worldwide on Twitter, even getting love from Alyssa Milano. Fuckin a – that’s what stopping 42 shots in prime time against a stacked (and, as the game wore on, increasingly desperate) Canadian team will get you. The East Lansing, Michigan native and former Hobey Baker Award winner played lights out in a hell of a performance, keeping his young teammates in the game after Canada battled back repeatedly and controlled play for long stretches of the game. Wearing #39 instead of the #30 he sports for the Sabres, Miller at times brought back memories of another #39 who dominated between the pipes both in Buffalo and in international play. Miller took 19 shots in the first alone, but threw up wall after wall against waves of attackers in red as the night progressed. Like the steely-eyed Uncle Sam on his helmet, Miller rolled up his sleeves and handled his goddamn business.

And Brian Rafalski is having the tournament of a lifetime. With two goals and an assist tonight, the wily vet and assistant captain continued to destroy the Olympics with his second straight multigoal game. He scored just 41 seconds in and at one point tonight he had scored Team USA’s last four goals. The current Red Wing and former Devil would not be denied on offense – when you’re beating Marty Brodeur, you’re beating the best in the world. And Rafalski did it twice.

Team Canada? Well, it was crickets quiet in the arena just five minutes after the game, as stunned Canadians swallowed a humiliating loss at home. Indeed, the tension had mounted steadily from the opening puck drop on as the Americans scored first and never trailed. The Canadians weren’t necessarily bad, but the US was simply better. Despite getting outshot by more than 20, the US buried their opportunities while the Canadians couldn’t convert on more than a few chances. The box score tells the story: Rick Nash a minus 3, Sidney Crosby a minus 3, Mike Richards a minus 2. Tonight’s loss and the shaky shootout win over the Swiss on Thursday mean that Team Canada has dug themselves a sizable hole. The home advantage hasn’t meant anything but added pressure, and the Canadians now have to win four straight games to win the gold medal that seemed theirs to lose only days ago. One would be foolish to rule the Canadians out of the running, but they’ve upped the difficulty level substantially as a result of their failure thus far.

Meanwhile, Ovechkin and the Russians have to be the favorite now, following a convincing performance against the Czechs today. Everybody see Ovechkin level Jagr? Damn! Here’s the animated .gif (via Puck Daddy) and here’s the NYT write-up. Now on to the nightcap: Finland vs. Sweden…

The Olympic Men’s Hockey tournament got pretty goddamn interesting last night as talented underdogs Slovakia and Switzerland took heavy medal favorites Canada and Russia to shootouts. (Haha: “heavy medal.”)

Canada dodged a big fat bullet on the strength of assistant captain and national golden boy Sidney Crosby’s successful second shootout attempt on sensational Swiss goalie Jonas Hiller. In the NHL, players are allowed just one bite at the proverbial apple, but in international play, teams can send shooters back out during a shootout after the first three rounds. (A quirk I don’t like – too tough on goalies and robs fans of the unique joy of watching grinders and defensemen try to score in later rounds.) As a result, Crosby – stoned by Hiller on his first run – got to reload and beat Hiller with a wrist shot. Watching the game, you knew #87 wasn’t going to miss twice, even with the weight of the entire nation on his back.

The collective sigh of relief was deafening; I could hear Toronto triumphantly slamming down beer bottles from my apartment in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. I have to admit that I was kinda hoping SUI would pull the upset – not just as a Team USA partisan, but because the Red Crosses were scrappy as hell. Dudes were hitting everything that moved: my favorite hit of the night was some Swiss dude I can’t remember leveling Getzlaf in the third along the blueline. Getzlaf kinda teetered around like Piston Honda, then realized he had been knocked on his ass and promptly fell backwards. Awesome. Not to mention Jonas Hiller’s unbelievable performance in the face of 46 shots from the Hosers, plus a knee to the skull from Rick Nash late in the game. He was marvelous, as was the Swiss penalty killing in the third. The Swiss only have two NHLers on the squad – Hiller and Mark Streit – but the rest of the team isn’t just beer league assholes. These guys played gritty as hell last night and almost pulled off a stunner.

(more…)

Last night I made a regrettable life decision and watched the Vancouver Winter Olympics opening ceremonies. Mistake. Given the high entertainment value of the Beijing 2008 opener, I thought watching last night’s Canadian gala would be a solid choice for my Friday evening. No.

I think it was right after Nelly Furtado and Bryan Adams finished their duet – 1993 and 2003, together at last! – that I realized that the True North wasn’t doing it anywhere near as big as the People’s Republic. The slam poet with the neck beard and the extended Sarah McLachlan performance only confirmed my suspicions.

And by the time k.d. lang came on (remember that? she spells her name in lower case?) everything was pretty far gone. Ol’ k.d. covered Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” – a song that will forever remind me of the Watchmen movie and one of film’s worst sex scenes – and someone pointed out that she looked like Fat Elvis. Suddenly I wanted my Friday night back, but it was too late.

I should note here that I love Canada. I grew up about 3 minutes from the Canadian border. I got CBC on my television as a kid, so I watched hours of it. Kids in the Hall, Degrassi, all that. Maybe that was the problem with last night. The whole thing reminded me of a 1991 CBC prime time variety show – like, exactly. The “punk rock fiddlers” from Newfoundland, the flying snowboarders, the light-bulbed rollerbladers, the Joni Mitchell ballad with a kid hoisted above the crowd on wires, Peter Pan style. I guess if you were a boring mom, you might call the proceedings “neat,” but even that tepid praise would be kinda generous. This big ghost bear was pretty all right, though.

But Vancouver saved the worst for last, and the torch fuck-up that closed the night out was the most excruciating part by far. So after all the other bullshit and two endless speeches by old white guys, it was finally time to light the damn torch. By this point – 3+ hours of Olympic coverage deep – I had made a pretty visble dent in the beer left over from the Super Bowl and I was about ready to torch my couch out of boredom. But all of a sudden Bobby Orr and Donald Sutherland and some other famous Canucks rolled out, so I calmed down. Then Gretzky showed up, along with Steve Nash (seriously) and a couple other torchbearers, and the crowd went wild.

(more…)

I know Caps usually does all of the Sporting Observations, but I wanted a chance to be a Homer here and do this one in particular. Anyone who obsessively gets hockey updates all day long on their mobile devices (i.e. Me) should already know the big news… The Eastern Conference was leveled a game changer named Ilya Kovalchuk to the Devils.

As a New Yorker, I’ve been an unabashed NJ Devils fan for well over 20 years now. Never in the history of this world class franchise have they ever aggressively went after and landed a player of Kovalchuk’s magnitude. They’ve never even drafted or iced a player of Kovalchuk’s magnitude! And this team has won 3 cups in the past 15 years, all done so without a true offensive superstar (all stars plenty, but no superstars). No knock on Zach Parise who is still the Devils best forward, but he’s not the offensive dynamo Kovalchuk is. And for those of you unfamiliar with my man Ilya, here are some highlight reels of him not only scoring goals but basically creating each and every opportunity for them by his lonesome.

The ramifications of this trade will be felt hard and wide within the NHL and not only because the Devils (who were already a strong team) just became Cup favorites. This trade is going to force one or more of the other elite teams in the NHL to make a move and try and catch up… a move that they will be doing from a position of weakness. The Carolina Hurricanes stand as the team (outside the Devils of course) to benefit the most short-term from this trade. I’m sure Carolina GM Jim Rutherford is licking his lips right now knowing that the price for Ray Whitney just got a bit steeper.

For the Thrashers, or rather Hockey in Atlanta this was a huge blow and could eventually lead to the team relocating. They were a long shot to make the playoffs with Kovy on the team, but without him lets just say “Taylor Hall sweepstakes here we come!”. They no longer have a gate attraction for their meager fan base and basically have to start from square one once again to reassure fans that they are committed to building a winning team.

Did the Thrashers get fair value back for Kovalchuk? In short no. But there is no such thing as fair value for a player of his caliber unless Ovechkin, Malkin or Crosby are going back the other way. Did the Thrashers get robbed? Absolutely not. The team was going to lose Kovalchuk regardless and they not only took the best deal on the table, they took one without any toxic contracts.

(more…)

Two for Tuesday: (1) Raiders QB & undisputed bust JaMarcus Russell is under the mistaken impression that he is the “Chosen”.

And (2) the triumphant return of the University of Alaska – Fairbanks’ mighty hockey bear.

That’s Scrotie, mascot for the Rhode Island School of Design’s sports teams – the Nads (hockey) and the Balls (basketball). Go Nads, support your Balls – you see how this works. Classic picture, but really, I just wanted to set up this segue: Speaking of dicks on ice… ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Patrick Kane!

Kane’s latest PR fuck-up has young Patrick in the back of a limo, shirtless and drinking Kokanees with some chicks in Vancouver. This isn’t really crazy – dude’s 21 and rich, can he live? – but elderly Canadians had a blast this week expressing their moral outrage and shaking their heads vigorously. Whatever. Wake me up when he’s smoking meth with underage chicks or bagging a hat trick on acid. Me, I’m just surprised Patty’s not rolling with the kind of boring model chicks I typically associate with hockey bros. No offense to his ladyfriends here – one of whom is real excited to be where she is – but they do not immediately appear to be models. And what the hell is 36-year-old John Madden (not that John Madden, hockey John Madden, formerly of the Devils) doing rolling around with these young ladies? Kris Versteeg gets a pass – he’s 24 – but you’d think Madden would be back at the hotel watching Cinemax or something. At least Kane’s indiscretion lets me play my cranky old-timer card: “In my day, the only time hockey dudes went shirtless was when they were giving each other fist-based concussions…”

At any rate, this is no big deal – especially when compared to Kane’s far more regrettable escapades – e.g., putting on blackface for Halloween and punching out a cabbie over 20 cents. C’mon son.

But out of the limo and on to the ice, where the playoff race is far more compelling than Kane’s “wild” Saturday night. Today’s Hockey Day in Canada, so more on the crowded East after the jump.

(more…)

A targeted injection of hockey violence to begin your Thursday evening. First up is Zack Kassian of the Windsor Spitfires destroys the Barrie Colts’ Matt Kennedy, a dirty piece of work that’s gonna cost young Kassian 20 games.

Next, Cam Janssen fucked up Carey Price pretty good last night.

But this last one’s in a different league, literally and figuratively. As some of you well know by now, the biggest brawl in professional hockey history took place a few weeks back in Moscow during a KHL match between Vityaz Chekhov and Avangard Omsk. The two teams started throwing punches 3 minutes and 27 seconds into the game. After three more brawls – one at 3:34 in, one at 3:37, and one at 3:39 – the game had to be called, since both teams had run out of players. More than 56 minutes were left in the game, but that was it; they were done. In under 4 minutes, 691 penalty minutes were awarded to 30 players. Jaromir Jagr even got involved – look out for #68 and his trademark mullet.

Be sure to watch the last ninety seconds. Classic material.

Yesterday, Moscow prosecutors launched a criminal investigation into the record-breaking melee: “An article of the Russian criminal code could punish the players in the form of community service for a period of 180 to 240 hours, or correctional labor for a term of one to two years, or imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years.”