I've been watching every hockey game during this Olympics, waking up at 6 am to assess each country. This is sacred time for me as a hockey fan. I would've watched the games if they were on at 3 am.
After 12 long years of no Olympics hockey with NHL players we've been spoiled with some classic games in the past week. And the best is saved for last.
I'm happy the two best teams are meeting in the final. I'll give my prediction below. But I just have to say, watching an Olympics without Russia just doesn't feel the same. It's like a World Cup without a Germany or a Brazil. It just doesn't feel right. It's unfair.
This was Ovechkin's last chance at Olympic gold. He was robbed of that opportunity. And the hockey world was robbed, too. It's a shame they dragged politics into it. I don't think Russia would've won, but with the best goaltending in the competition and elite game breakers up front they had as good a chance as any of the traditional hockey powers. Russia would have at least competed for third place.
That it's going to be Canada vs the United States for gold was not inevitable. The Finns and Swedes put up a great fight. It could have easily been them in the gold medal game. But they played too conservatively.
Finland had Canada down 2-0 in the semi-final and stopped playing from that point on. Russia would have taken it to Canada, and focus on scoring goals instead of defending a lead. If you want to win gold, you need to play with aggression.
I expect the U.S. to not play conservative tomorrow. I think it's going to be a shootout, a back and forth classic. And I have the Americans winning 5-3. I think it'll be a close game, a one goal game until the final minutes, and I could see the U.S. scoring an empty netter at the end as Canada tries to take it to overtime.
I hope I'm wrong. But the Canadian team is running on fumes. They had to claw their way to even make this final. With their captain Sidney Crosby sidelined with an injury and Nathan MacKinnon not a hundred percent healthy, they don't have the firepower to withstand the U.S. depth. I think they have the four best players, with the aforementioned MacKinnon, Connor McDavid, Cale Makar, and teenager Macklin Celebrini, but the U.S. has the better overall team. Their defense is much deeper. They play faster. And speed kills in a tournament like this one.
Last night I re-watched the gold medal game from the 2010 Olympics. I know Crosby emerged as the final hero of that clash, but without Luongo that game wouldn't have even gone to overtime. For the last ten minutes the Americans pushed relentlessly, and Luongo stood tall, only giving up the tying goal.
Can Canada's goalie Jordan Binnington replicate that performance? He's my X factor for tomorrow's game. He has to be the 2019 St. Louis Blues Binnington. He has to be on the top of his game for Canada to have a chance. Anything less and it's silver.
