Dear Russia,

Thanks for coming.

Not Your Buddies,
Canada's Terrance and Phillip


From everything we've heard, the city of Vancouver has done a tremendous job with the Olympics.  The scenery is beautiful, it looks like one big party once nightfall comes, and the people just seem genuinely friendly.

But four days ago, team USA hockey just plain pissed off team Canada and their fans.  And I'm not sure there will be any turning back.  As mentioned in my last post, the 5-3 victory cemented the United States as a true contender to win it all.  Canada's loss in that game, combined with its struggles to beat Switzerland in the preliminaries, set the country into a frenzy of worry (Such as benching perhaps the best goalie to ever play the game.  Was it the right move?  TBD...)

Well Canada has, um, responded to all the criticism.  Since they finished outside the top 4 seeds, you could tell they were embarrassed in having to play Germany in the first round.  Canada left no doubt, dominating from the opening faceoff and winning the game by a women-esque score of 8-2.  It was pretty much expected.  No big deal.

But yesterday's homicide of team Russia?  Whoa, nellie.  If you read my projections on where each team would finish, you'd see that I had Russia winning the gold over Canada.  Admittedly, it was a bland prediction (at least 90% of all hockey fans expected the two squads to finish gold-silver in whatever order.)  Top to bottom, Canada has the most talent by a wide margin.  Russia has gamebreakers such as Evgeni Malkin, Ilya Kovalchuk and obviously, Ovechkin the Great.  The world was ready for a truly epic quarterfinal matchup. 

And that's what the world got.  For about 10 minutes.  Canada snuck in an early tally as the game went back and forth for 10 expectedly-incredible minutes of gameplay.  But remember how everyone was talking about Ryan Miller and how he, as a goaltender, can "steal" a game like he did against Canada.  Well after those first ten minutes, Evgeni Nabakov did exactly the opposite for Russia.  That's right, Nabakov "donated" the game yesterday.  

He just lost it.  The Russian starter stopped just under 74% of the shots he faced (Roberto Luongo stopped a hair under 90% for Canada.)  There was only one man on the planet who thought that keeping Nabakov in the game was the correct move.  Unfortunately, it was Russia's coach.  Once backup Ilya Bryzgalov mercifully entered the game, Canada had already blown them out of the building.  It's a wonder that Bryzgalov was able to stop 18 out of 19 shots.  It's a much bigger wonder as to whether or not the game may have changed had Nabakov been pulled in a 4-1 game.

But it's a moot point.  The bottom line is that Russia is simply the latest victim in Canada's killing spree.  The host country has scored 15 goals in its last two games and is just salivating at the opportunity of revenge against the good ol' US of A.

The Americans will be waiting.  They defeated Switzerland 2-0 in what must be considered their least-overwhelming victory yet.  But don't forget that the Swiss have been pesky, forcing Canada to a shootout in the preliminaries.  There also might have been an itty bitty bit of 'ice rust' for the US after their first-round bye.  Whatever the case, I for one am happy that Canada next up for the Americans.  The USA will need to defeat Finland to advance to the gold medal game.  If Canada wants to join them, it will have to beat a dangerous Slovakia team that took out defending-champion Sweden last night.

In short, the time for what-ifs is over.  Canada and the USA didn't want to underestimate their early opponents by talking about winning gold.  Now the opportunity for the rematch of the titans is just a step away.  Finland and Slovakia are talented and have earned their place in the semis.  But for the North American neighbors, anything less than a gold-medal rematch must be considered a disappointment. 

Canada emphatically told Russia, "I'm not your buddy, guy!"

America is hoping for (another) chance to respond, "I'm not your guy, friend!"

(You are now free to watch this video if you have no idea what the hell I'm talking about.  Sorry for making you wait so long for it.)