Offtopic: Have you ever been to a speedskating event?

Well, at least you didn't spend half the game in the PB against the Finns. I really dislike the int'l rules of both hockey and basketball. Puts the North American rules playing folk at to much of a disadvantage by removing the brute strength element of the game entirely. I don't like brawls; but tippy tappy hockey and basketball that's all gaurd play or 7' forwards shooting 15' jumpers all the time is just plain WRONG. A fast paced but hard hitting game of hockey is great. Seeing someone like Kevin McHale work his footwork magic in the paint is fun to watch, and believe me, it takes strength to not travel when doing that.

I believe you, I believe you.<p>Art: No, I have not seen speedskating and I missed the seven cities when I lived in the Netherlands 20 years ago by showing up one week late.

The Ottawa Citizen had the right balance in their headline this morning:

"Sweet 4, Bitter 1"

It's a shame that Canada's best ever day at the Olympics will have to share time (and likely be overshadowed) by the latest "crisis" in Canadian hockey.

There is no crisis in Canadian hockey. There are dinosaurs in charge whose glory days were at least ten years ago.

I agree 100% that there is no crisis (hence the quotes around the word). If there was an emoticon for rolling eyes, that's where I would have used it.

I'm not sure if you're referring to Gretzky or Quinn as the dinosaur. I wouldn't go that far for Gretzky, although he was too loyal to some players who didn't deserve to be there (Bertuzzi, Pronger) at the expense of guys who are actually having good years.

As a Sens fan, I have a hard time evaluating Quinn objectively, but he sure didn't seem to make any adjustments. Team Canada had the talent to win, but they played like the Leafs.

(Icehockey) There are dinosaurs in charge whose glory days were at least ten years ago.
<p>
I just learned that Klassen was originally an icehockey player...
</p>

Read in the NY Times about goonblog.com , an amusing site about old style hockey play, emphasis on physical. Especially of interest to Bruins fans. Speaking of which, did I hear that one of the US players performed some serious dental work on a Finn? God, that's desperate, if you have to try taking out some teeth to win. Next time, use your stick on the puck and try to find the goal.

gr, not quite serious dental work, just a bloody nose. But yeah, that isn't Good Hockey. Not quite as emberassing as the shenanigans of the Nagano games(where they almost killed Mike Richter with fire extinguisher particulates--and the US got bounced quickly and easily from the games), but still highly disappointing(the US won the World Hockey TOurney about a decade ago, it's not like we don't know how to play). Losing 4-3 isn't quite all goon all the time though. Most of the calls were for hooking.
They just never got a sustained rhthym and suffered for it. Either that or there's a taint from the NJ Devil center ice trap that's never quite gone away.

2 teeth and some blood, I hear, better the guy kept his teeth and US won the game or something. Real Goons play a clean but fast and hard hitting game in my book. And yeah, hooking....sigh.