Even losing, unified team for Korea celebrates

PYEONGCHANG, SOUTH KOREA — In a historic moment whose impact reverberated far beyond the happily noisy confines of Kwandong Hockey Centre, diplomacy took the unusual form of ponytailed hockey players and a squadron of cheerleaders who sang and swayed and clapped while a unique occasion unfolded on the ice below them.

The unified women’s team of players from North and South Korea took to the ice amid waving flags and smiles of politicians who have long been bitter opponents. Long after the details of Korea’s 8-0 loss to a sound Swiss team are forgotten, the fact that North and South banded together and wore jerseys depicting a joined Korean peninsula will be remembered as a landmark occasion.

“It definitely was a special moment, debuting as a unified team,” said Korea defenseman Marissa Brandt, who was born in South Korea but was adopted and raised by a couple in Minnesota. She’s known here by her birth name, Park Yoonjung.

“Definitely, a situation as small as this goes, being unified through sport, hopefully that can be a small step to something bigger,” she said.

International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach, South Korean President Moon Jae-in, North Korea’s ceremonial head of state Kim Young Nam and Kim Yo Jong — sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un — sat together in the crowd of 3,606, a noteworthy display of the harmony that the Olympics are supposed to create and promote. Afterward, they told players basically to keep their heads up, to look at the bigger picture of the goodwill they are promoting rather than the score.

Three North Koreans played Saturday in the lineup chosen by coach Sarah Murray. She said she had not been pressured to play a greater number and chose forwards Kim Un Hyang, Su Hyon Jong and opening ceremony flag bearer Hwang Chung Gum and put them on different lines.

“I have a lot of control,” said Murray, who has shown poise in blending players from the South and the North after the arrangement was agreed on only a few weeks ago and players who had been with the team for years were consigned to a practice squad. “I thought that I might get more pushback from the North with who I was picking and who I wasn’t picking, but they’ve been nothing but supportive.”

It was all but certain they wouldn’t win Saturday. Switzerland earned a bronze medal in the 2014 Olympics and has many North American-trained players.

As for the Korean team, forward Randi Heesoo Griffin, the North Carolina-born daughter of a South Korean mother, said the North Koreans had been accepted by their new teammates: “I have nothing but positive things to say about them … They work hard, they have a great attitude and they’re doing everything they can to connect with their teammates and learn our systems.”

It will take time for improvement, but Murray said the North Koreans have had a positive impact. “The chemistry on the team is better than I could have ever predicted,” she said. “I’ll walk into the locker room and they’re laughing together and you can’t tell who’s from the North and who’s from the South. They’re just girls playing hockey.”

Better than that. Those women became a symbol of hope and harmony.