MILAN — Italy left wing Luca Frigo has played against NHL superstar Sidney Crosby hundreds, maybe thousands of times.
In video games.
“Sidney Crosby, Nathan Mackinnon and all those superstars that you follow were also in the video games,” Frigo said. “So now we will see them and play against them.”
After a 12-year-absence, the NHL is back at the Olympic Games.
When Finland meets Slovakia at the Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena it will mark the first time since Sochi 2014 that NHL players will take the ice at the Olympic Games. League players missed the 2018 Olympic Games in South Korea because of disputes between the NHL, the International Olympic Committe and the International Ice Hockey Federation over insurance, the league’s inability to use media from the Olympics to promote the NHL, and player injuries. It looked like NHL players would return for the 2022 Olympic Games in Beijing until COVID hit.
After the NHL reached a deal with the IOC and IIHF to return the Games, the league’s players’ participation was once again in jeopardy last fall over concerns about whether Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena would actually be ready in time for the Olympics, and even if it was ready, would it be safe?
Finally, a justifiably annoyed NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and the league’s owners gave a final green light.
“It’s been a long time coming,” Team Canada center Connor McDavid said.
“It was difficult,” Crosby, the Pittsburgh and Team Canada center. “You try not to get your hopes up too much, but you also had to be ready in case we did go.
“It was a bit of a rollercoaster.”
And the rollercoaster arrives at the Milano Cortina Olympic Games at the same place it left off a dozen years ago at the 2014 Games in Sochi: with Canada and the U.S. as the pre-tournament favorites.
Canada led by Crosby won the last two Olympic Games that NHL players have participated in, and if anything, the 12-year absence has only increased the expectations on Team Canada to win the gold medal in Milan.
“Would you rather be in a situation where, ‘Oh my god, I can’t wait to win the bronze!’” Team Canada head coach Jon Cooper said. “No way, man, I want to be the team that is gold or bust.
“If you are not the team being chased, I do not want to be the chaser.
“We are pumped to go to war with these guys.”
Team USA general manager Bill Guerin is even more to the point.
“We have to win,” he said.
The Americans lost to Team Canada in both the 2002 and 2010 Olympic gold medal games. The 2010 final, arguably the greatest game in Olympic history, was decided in sudden-death overtime by a Crosby goal. Canada also edged the U.S. in last year’s NHL’s 4 Nations Face-Off final.
Team Canada might actually be stronger than it was at the 4 Nations.
McDavid is leading the NHL in scoring at the Olympic break with 96 points with MacKinnon just three points aback. Team Canada has veteran experience. Crosby and Kings defenseman Drew Doughty are chasing their third Olympic gold medals. And in San Jose’s Macklin Celebrini, the North Vancouver 19-year-old, the Canadians have one of the game’s brightest young superstars.
Celebrini is fourth in the NHL in scoring at the Olympic break with 81 points. But he’s about to find out that the red maple leaf sweater can seem to weigh heavier at the Olympic Games.
“You look at our country,” said Team Canada defenseman Cale Makar “and everyone is looking at us to do something special.”
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