Another Golden WJHC!!!
Posted: January 6, 2006, 1:35 am
Watched the gold medal game tonight and all I can say is WOW!!! The pre-game analysts were talking about board play and I after to give James Duthie credit for his analysis that Team Canada was great on the boards: they played Team USA, Team Finland and Team Russia right into them. I had the volume up on the TV and it sounded more like a thunder storm than a hockey game.
I honestly don't think I've enjoyed a World Jrs since the lockout season about 10 years ago with Harvey, Bertuzzi, O' Neil, McCabe, Redden, Jovonoski et al. This team Canada was physical defensive hockey at its finest, and definately not boring to watch (the WJHC never is).
One thing that bugged me about the games I did watch was the attitude of the Vancouver fans to Team USA. If you don't want to cheer for them, thats fine, but WTF is with booing and getting on them in every game, even when they weren't playing our guys? I can understand it a bit in the Canada-USA game, esp after the Jack Johnson hit but well before that, the "USA sucks" chants were unnecessary and didn't reflect well on a host city. And the fans cheering the Russians at the end of the USA-Russia game, when the Russians were head hunting was beyond the pale as well. As fans we don't have to like the opposition but as hosts we do owe them respect.
But in the end, seeing Team Canada hammer the Russian head hunters until they folded their tents, made me smile. DAMN I love the Jrs... and hate that the Leafs own the rights to Pogge AND Rask.
The Olympics are gonna have a tall order to match this tourney (again).
I honestly don't think I've enjoyed a World Jrs since the lockout season about 10 years ago with Harvey, Bertuzzi, O' Neil, McCabe, Redden, Jovonoski et al. This team Canada was physical defensive hockey at its finest, and definately not boring to watch (the WJHC never is).
One thing that bugged me about the games I did watch was the attitude of the Vancouver fans to Team USA. If you don't want to cheer for them, thats fine, but WTF is with booing and getting on them in every game, even when they weren't playing our guys? I can understand it a bit in the Canada-USA game, esp after the Jack Johnson hit but well before that, the "USA sucks" chants were unnecessary and didn't reflect well on a host city. And the fans cheering the Russians at the end of the USA-Russia game, when the Russians were head hunting was beyond the pale as well. As fans we don't have to like the opposition but as hosts we do owe them respect.
But in the end, seeing Team Canada hammer the Russian head hunters until they folded their tents, made me smile. DAMN I love the Jrs... and hate that the Leafs own the rights to Pogge AND Rask.
The Olympics are gonna have a tall order to match this tourney (again).
