And the big ice hockey buzz is ... nowhere

Kevin Dupont

TURIN, Italy - The best pickup hockey game the world has to offer plays out this month in Italy, a land not foreign to the Olympic ice game, but one far more partial to winter sports played with bindings, longer blades and a pair of spike-tipped poles instead of a single stick.

To the average Italian, Olympic hockey is barely an after-ski talking point. Please, spare all that talk of the Russian power play and pass the espresso. Dare to mention decaf and you run the risk of being fed head-first into a snow groomer, or at the very least, heaved under a Ferrari-charged Zamboni.

Americans typically grow weepy, nostalgic, and puffed full of nationalistic pride over the mere mention of the Yanks’ gold-medal miracle at Lake Placid in 1980. But it’s not likely even the proudest, most puck-loving Italian will recall how their boys finished eighth in the 1948 Games at St. Moritz, or inched into the No. 7 spot in the ‘56 Games at Cortina. And those were Italy’s best finishes.

Today’s Olympic ice hockey, from the world’s viewpoint, is vastly different than the game that debuted at the 1920 Winter Games in Antwerp.

In fact, the tournament has been radically overhauled from the 1980 version that included Team USA’s stunning defeat of the CCCP along the way to the gold medal — what stands as America’s last Olympic ice hockey gold.

Slide show   Olympic hockey hopefuls Click to see the best non-U.S. players competing in Turin

Beginning in 1998, in the Games at Nagano (Japan), the pros came marching in and the amateurs went marching out. For hockey, similar to how NBA players altered the landscape of the Summer Games, it was the end of the innocence.

Never again would we see Jim Craig, the American flag draped over his shoulders as he skated on the ice, in a near-frantic search for his father in the Lake Placid stands. Also lost forever, another signature moment from the ‘80 Games, U.S. captain Mike Eruzione beckoning all of his red-white-and-blue brothers to join him on the medal stand.

“It’s completely different now, in every way,” Eruzione said just days before NHL’ers packed their bags for Turin. “I'm not saying that’s bad. Everything changes over time. But for me, personally, the spirit of the Olympics was the amateurs. All that is gone.”

What we have today, quite frankly, is the NHL’s wicked cool winter break at Olympus. The 30 best professional teams in the world divide up their ranks, turn their arenas dark, then await word on which of their best men captured the glory before Lords of the Rings. The Czechs won in ‘98, and the Canadians, after a half-century gold medal drought, dumped the USA in the final at Salt Lake City (‘02).

After an NHL season lost to a lockout in 2004-‘05, it really didn’t make a great deal of marketing sense for the NHL to shut down and sends its guys to Olyworld again this season.  However, the locked out NHL players insisted at the bargaining table last summer that any new Collective Bargaining Agreement would have to include a two-week hall pass to the Games.

One season lost, and the threat of another faded to black, NHL club owners quickly agreed that going to the Games again would indeed be a good thing. One season is a terrible thing to waste. Two seasons? The NHL, already challenged to keep its customers satisfied, ran the risk of permanently dissing its fan base.

TV ratings this month will prove again ... and again ... and again ... that the Winter Olympics is first and foremost a figure skating event, especially for American viewers. It’s not hockey that gets housewives and their daughters to drop housework and homework for those intermittent glimpses of Olympus. It’s those darling little girls, the high-flying pixies and their pirouettes.

Even with the nearly year-round flood of televised ice skating shows, figure skating still takes center stage every four years. Meanwhile, the hockey players, some of whom skate more elegantly than the tiny teenyboppers, typically get relegated to third-world viewing status.   Who knows, ratings could skyrocket if someone put Ranger superstar Jaromir Jagr in a sequins-sprinkled tutu .... nah. As much as an Islander fan might like that ... nah.

Slide show   Best of Team USA Click to see top U.S. hockey stars competing at Games

For the most part, what happens at the Olympics, at least from an NHL fan’s point of view, stays at the Olympics.

By the time the fight for the Stanley Cup rolls around again this April, the Games will have been finished for six weeks.  No matter how thrilling the action or outcome in Italy, fans in 16 NHL cities will be totally absorbed on the postseason’s opening game. The Cup winner won’t be named until the start of June, nearly two months later, following a total of four best-of-seven series.  The first round alone lasts longer than the Olympic tournament. On the overall hockey menu, the Olympics slots in as an appetizer.

Now, as appetizers go, hey, not bad. This is one great, gourmet tournament. And let’s not forget, not the entire world is wrapped up in the the New NHL — you know, the one that this season adopted an Olympic-like shootout to settle overtime ties.

In ‘98, the first time the pros stocked Olympic rosters across the board, the Czechs won the gold, mostly due to Dominik Hasek's heroics in net.  Back in downtown Prague, to where the Czech players quickly bolted for a hero's reception, the Olympic hangover became a city block party and was unofficially declared a national holiday.

MORE FROM ICE HOCKEY

Ice hockey Section Front

How Swede it is Lidstrom's goal lifts Sweden to gold Guerin backs Modano in wake of criticism Crosby still won't rip Canada officials Celizic: America's top 10 Olympic busts Vote: Most memorable hockey moment? An inside look at Olympic hockey Olympic men's hockey rosters Ice hockey Section Front   Add Ice hockey headlines to your news reader: