With NHL snubbing Olympics, Russian veterans eye hockey chance
WASHINGTON: With National Hockey League superstars staying home from Pyeongchang, the stage is set for a wide-open Winter Olympic men’s hockey tournament featuring top talent from Russia’s Kontinental Hockey League.
Two- time defending Olympic champion Canada seeks a fourth men’s gold from five tournaments despite the absence of elite NHL players at the Winter Games for the first time since 1994.
“What real ly makes this Olympics interesting is that a lot of countries who didn’t consider themselves medal contenders, or gold medal contenders especially if the NHL was to go, are now looking at this as an opportunity,” Canada general manager Sean Burke told Toronto Sportsnet radio.
“It’s going to be a very intense, competitive tournament. A lot of countries are looking at this as a chance they haven’t had in a long time.”
The NHL opte d agains t shutting down its season and allowing top players to compete for their homelands, balking when asked to pay for insurance and transportation so star players could risk mid-season injury.
But missing NHL talent doesn’t mean Canadian fans will accept less just because unfamiliar faces wear national team uniforms.
“Canada’s expectations are never any less,” Burke said. “Our expectations are to go out there and compete and have a chance to win the gold.”
The Russians have not managed a medal since a 2002 bronze and have not taken gold since 1992 at Albertville as the Unified Team in the wake of the breakup of the Soviet Union, which had won six of the prior seven Olympic crowns.
But this could be the year to end the drought as the core of the KHL’s two top clubs, eight players from CSKA Moscow and 15 from SKA St. Petersburg, unite into an allstar squad. A ban imposed by the International Olympic Committee over systemic Russian doping, notably at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, will see Russian players compete as “Olympic Athletes from Russia” without the nation’s flag or anthem or uniforms.
“They took our flag and anthem but not our honor and convictions,” Russian captain Ilya Kovalchuk said, according to the Russia Today website.
“I believe our fans will support us even more. We will try to do everything to justify their hopes.” Kovalchuk, a 34-year- old former NHL star who leads the KHL in scoring with 31 goals and 32 assists in 53 games, and SKA teammate Pavel Datsyuk, a 39- year- old centre who won two Stanley Cups in 14 NHL seasons with Detroit, will make their fifth Olympic appearance.
The Russian lineup will be coached by Oleg Znarok, who guided SKA to last season’s KHL crown and the Russians to podiums at four world championships since taking over after Russia was fifth on 2014 Olympic home ice in Sochi.
Rivals will assemble their best players from European clubs to challenge the chemistry- laden “OAR” squad, but it could take another 1980 USA “Miracle on Ice” to deny them. — AFP