The women’s hockey tournament is already underway, but the men – including Tom Wilson, Logan Thompson, and Martin Fehervary – will get their Olympic Games going tomorrow. As we await the return of NHLers to the Olympic stage for the first time in over a decade, we thought we’d tackle a few pressing (and not-so-pressing) questions about Milano Cortina and beyond!
We’ll start by being vicious – kick someone off an Olympic roster and pick a Capital to replace him:
Becca: Get Drew Doughty the hell off of Team Canada and put Jakob Chychrun in there instead. Absolutely insane that he was seemingly not even in the conversation for a spot on the team when the zombie husk of Doughty made the cut.
Luke: I think Becca picked the right one here, but to be different I’ll say Ryan Leonard should have been in there instead of JT Miller. Miller has been putting out really bad vibes for a couple years now with some bad effort on the ice and in the locker room. Lenny would have brought 110% every shift and brought a ton of energy to the team.
Rob: I could put Chychrun on the Canadian roster over half of the guys they took; but recognizing they need guys to PK and stay at home I’ll focus on the guy that is going to play an offensive role: Shea Theodore. What does Theodore bring that Chychrun doesn’t, besides his head coach? He’s had a reputation as a young offensive defender for years now, but his play hasn’t kept up. He’s got 19 goals total in the 2+ seasons since winning the Stanley Cup. Chychrun has 21 this season. If the Team Canada brass holds his defense against him, at least he would bring an elite offensive component. To say that Shea Theodore is a one-dimensional defender would mislead the reader…
Alex: I wholeheartedly agree that out of all of the Caps not on an Olympic roster, Chychrun is the biggest snub—I’d probably put him into the lineup over Travis Sanheim. The argument could be made for swapping him in for Colton Parayko as well, but Parayko has his giant physical presence going for him that Chychrun can’t replicate.
Hit us with your favorite Winter Olympics memory (hockey or otherwise)!
Becca: Watching women’s hockey become a part of the Games back in ‘98 and then seeing Cami Granato and the American women take home the first-ever gold medal was just an incredible moment. It really started the momentum for bringing women’s hockey to the forefront, and we’ve seen it go from the novelty of that first year to a must-watch every four years to the emergence of professional leagues to the wild success of the PWHL today.
Luke: The TJ Oshie’s Olympic shootout was just stellar entertainment. The fact that he ended up on the Caps roster not far after that game made it all the more sweeter. Ah the good ol’ days where you could be proud to be an American. I miss that feeling.
Rob: Favorite hockey moment is the Peter Forsberg shootout for gold. Favorite American moment is Dan Jansen finally breaking through and winning gold.
Alex: The one that immediately came to mind was watching the US women’s hockey team win the gold medal in PyeongChang in 2018. I was watching in my college apartment by myself because it was late at night, and I was screaming my head off during the shootout. When Jocelyne Lamoureux (now Lamoureux-Davidson) scored the shootout winner, I was chanting “U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!” so loudly I probably woke up some of my neighbors. And I’ll share a bonus non-hockey favorite memory: Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir’s iconic 2018 ice dance gold medal-winning Moulin Rouge free skate. I watch it regularly (this is not an exaggeration), and if you haven’t seen it I highly recommend.
What is your favorite non-hockey event at the Winter Olympics?
Becca: I LOVE watching figure skating, and this year I’m especially enjoying the little hockey/DMV tie-in with Quad God (and Virginia-native) Ilia Malinin, rocking Ovi’s yellow skate laces, and really the whole US figure skating team is delightful and fun to watch this year.
But I really love it all. Love the skiing, the speed skating, the sliding sports, the curling, all good things.
…except cross-country skiing. Too much frozen spit and snot on their faces for me to tune in.
Luke: After hockey, my favorite winter sport is curling. It’s a pretty quick moving game but still has these slow burn pauses that have huge payoffs. Plus it’s a sport I feel like I could play which makes it even more fun. One of these days I’ll head down to Laurel Garden Ice House to try it out.
Rob: Curling is the best (and most relatable) of any of the other sports.
Alex: I’m with Becca, I’m a HUGE figure skating fan. I watch it year-round and then get even more into it during the Olympics. This year’s US team is incredible (they already won a gold medal in the team event!)—in addition to the Quad God, we also have women who will be legitimately competitive in the singles event and the best ice dance pair on the ice right now in Chock and Bates. I also really enjoy the snowboarding and skiing half-pipe and big air events, it’s always so impressive.
When it comes to the Olympics though, I’ll watch and get super into any event. Every four years my Google search history is full of things like “what does having the hammer in curling mean” and “regular vs goofy stance snowboarding” and “who came up with doubles luge” so I can get fully invested. I will say…skeleton kind of terrifies me even as a spectator. It’s like someone saw luge and said, “How can we make this even more dangerous? Oh, I know, we’ll have them go down head-first!” It’s still super cool, it just makes me very tense.