First of all, thank you to Phil and all the fine folks at SportsZone Monday on WMHW 91.5 for having me on tonight. I always love talking hockey, and talking hockey on the radio is just that much sweeter. Thanks to Phil for mentioning the blog, and if anyone actually came here after that then I thank you very much for that.
Let's talk Olympic hockey, shall we? Last night's game between America and Canada will undoubtedly go down as one of the more important games in Olympic hockey history, and is the first signature win for the Americans since 1980. Everyone knows what happened last night; you've all read the articles and seen the replays on tv a thousand times by now, so let's not waste time rehashing that. Instead, let's look at one of the more eerie parallels from last night's game.
Team Canada was too reminiscent of the Wings for my taste. Here you have Canada, the undisputed favorite, against a lowly American squad of mid-level NHL talent (with a few exceptions). What happens? The giant falls asleep and, in classic sleeping giant fashion, doesn't wake up until the last minute, where they play a game of "too little, too late." Canada did exactly what the Wings do far too often. They look like they're playing normal speed, but you don't realize how poorly they were playing until they absolutely control play in the last 5 minutes of a game, frantically trying to make up for lost time, bombarding the goalie with more shots than most teams can manage in an entire game.
So what's the good news here? I haven't seen this as much from the Wings this year. Maybe it's because they aren't the conference leader for the first time since Power Rangers was cool. Or maybe it's because we still haven't seen this team play with its roster intact and uninjured. I'm guessing it's the latter...
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