Lincicome: Do politicians really have to bring their fights to hockey again?
Geopolitics has apparently invaded the world of sports again, usually the domain of the Olympics and of soccer but recently stirred by ice hockey, where anthems were booed and gloating was tweeted.
Not since the Miracle on Ice had anyone projected hockey into real world significance, allowing the game to withdraw to its unused corner of irrelevance, reappearing like Punxsutawney Phil only for special occasions.
Such a thing was something known as the 4 Nations Face-Off, it being apart from the regular NHL season much as the Blackhawks appear to be.
Sweden, Finland, Canada and the U.S. of A., were the designated 4 with the final game coming down to what our sitting POTUS referred to as “our cherished and very important 51st state” against the real U.S., equally cherished and important, I am assuming.
This seemed more than the usual sports banter where pols bet local gifts on the outcome, although had it been, I can see the winner getting Greenland.
Someone — not me — described the affair as “nation defining,” an example of the kind of verbal excess that gets out of hand when a ball, or in this case, a puck, is involved and the stakes are goosed by innocent and manipulated patriotism.
The 4 Nations was concocted to raise hockey’s profile, conceding that it does need raising. Heads of state snapped at each other and the players felt the weight of the moment.
Headline writers and podcasters weighed in, adding significance to irrelevance, and young patriots did their duty on the ice. “Pretty cool,” said one of the U.S. players.
See, there is nothing wrong with hockey. Apparently, nothing a few cross-border insults won’t fix.
This is not to crow. I am not a politician, but I am a hockey purist.
Confessing to being a hockey purist may be the same as declaring myself to be an organic gardener. There are not that many of us and we insist on doing things the hard way.
The facts are these: Hockey is of less interest according to TV ratings than college women's basketball and WWF Smackdown, which is sort of hockey without clothes.
I was in Lake Placid for the game that made America great again, the amateur Americans beating the professional Soviets, when nothing really changed except we pulled out of the Moscow Olympics.
Not to compare this with that, but on that night, and for a few more days, it felt like the world was a better place, it felt good, just as it likely does in Canada today, no matter that Canada generally cleans our clock in hockey.
How we became the bad guys and Canada the good guys is easy to follow for anyone with a computer or cable TV, and if there is any upside to losing at a game almost nobody here plays, it is that we have contributed genuine happiness to a generally happy place.
So seriously miffed were the Canadians that they protested by booing our anthem and not just because it is impossible to sing. And some words in their anthem, “O Canada,” maybe the easiest of all anthems to sing, were changed to emphasize Canadian exclusivity.
Silliness bumped up against belligerence. The greatest Canadian hockey hero of them all, Wayne Gretzky, reportedly gave a thumbs-up to the U.S. team before the final game, but not to the Canadian team. And he wore a suit instead of a team jersey. Et tu, Wayne.
After the final, with Canada winning in overtime, Justin Trudeau mocked — on social media as these things are done these days — “You can’t take our country and you can’t take our game.”
Not to take sides, but we’ve already done that. I must point out that hockey’s big prize, the Stanley Cup, now sweats in South Florida, lately taken from Las Vegas and before that a couple of years in Tampa, while more than three decades ago Montreal was the last Canadian team to win it all.
Just saying. Just kidding. Or maybe not.