JOINT KOREAS TO PART WAYS AGAIN
They may have finished seventh in the women’s hockey event but they will go down in history as Koreas’ first ever joint Olympic squad After suffering another loss, the Koreas, longtime bitter rivals, will now go their separate ways possibly never to see e
They cheered. They cried. They hugged. They watched as fans by the thousands shouted, “We are one.” Unification flags for the two Koreas, longtime rivals and sometimes bitter enemies, flapped across the Olympic arena.
And now they go back home, quite possibly never to see each other again.
The Korean women’s hockey team, which included players from both North and South, ended its historic Olympic run on Tuesday with a fifth straight loss but a host of unforgettable feelgood sparks.
Team Korea was defeated by Sweden 6-1 in a seventh-place match in the Pyeongchang Games on Tuesday, a healthy crowd again on hand to cheer them on.
The team lost by a combined score of 28-2 in its games and was rarely competitive. Yet the repeated defeats were, for many, insignificant. Instead, this notion dominated discussion: the significance of the Koreas’ first-ever joint Olympic squad taking the ice smack in the middle of an abrupt, now ongoing reconciliation between the rival Koreas.
“They are an amazing group,” said the team’s Canadian coach, Sarah Murray, who wept while hugging some of her squad.
“I could have never imagined our players being this competitive in the Olympics,” Murray said after the game. “So when I was standing there I was just so proud of them, just watching them skate around and salute the fans.”
South Korean forward Kim Heewon wiped away tears as she and teammates waved to cheering fans during a standing ovation. Some spectators wept as Korean players — North and South — stood in a circle at the center of the rink and hit the ice with their sticks in a post-game ceremony before leaving the rink.
“It’s been a special opportunity to get to know those girls, and we’ll miss having them around,” said player Randi Heesoo Griffin of Cary, North Carolina, whose mother is South Korean.
The two governments bar their citizens from visiting each other’s country and exchanging phone calls, letters and emails. Griffin said she understood that when it came to staying in touch, “there’s some barriers to that, obviously.”
“I mean, none of them have Facebook, so might be hard,” Griffin said. “But there were definitely bonds that were formed. And I think if we end up playing against each other again, South Korea vs. North Korea, there’s definitely going to be some hugs and some smiles.”