This is the Olympic day I have been anticipating since the opening of the games. The first day of curling action and the first day of Men's hockey, and I was in heaven thanks to the USA Network, my lovely wife letting me watch 6 straight hours of the games, and again my lovely wife letting me connect to the plum sauce of our Vancouver vacation via a McDonald's promotion.
#1: The US Men beat up on the Swiss 3-1. Ryan Miller changed out of his Sabres jersey and into the Red, White & Blue, and lead the Americans to a nice 3-1 win against Switzerland in the opening game of the Olympic tournament. Ducks star Bobby Ryan nailed the first goal of the games for the American side, and he was followed up by goals from David Backes and Ryan Malone to beat up on the Swiss impartials. Ryan Miller may have had his shutout bid denied by Roman Wick (a 2004 draft pick of the Sens, and he was assisted by Hnat Domenichelli, a former Hartford Whalers draft pick...no joke), but he was solid enough between the pipes to start us off. Imagine that only the third goal by Ryan Malone featured an assist, but Ryan Suter, and the other two American goals belonged to the unassisted category. While Canada starts against Norway later today, the next American match is the 18th (also against Norway).
#2: The US Men's curlers blew it against Germany. Despite winning the Bronze medal in Torino, the American curling squad obviously comes in as the serious underdog. Of course, everyone is expecting Canada to easily walk away with the gold. I love an underdog, but after the way we played against Germany, I'm a little concerned. Skip John Shuster made a couple of really poor shots, and we were just simply outplayed by the Germans 7-5 in the opening bonspiel. Germany was able to place the rocks in such a better manner than we were, and the concerns about this squad being a mostly rookie Olympic squad obviously rang true. However, as the announcers put it, the quality of a curling team is shown on their ability to bounce back. We won't have to wait long to find out about this squad, as they play Norway tonight in Vancouver (tape delayed to be shown at midnight tonight). Canada, as you could hear from the cheers during the American game, came away with a 7-6 win over the Norwegians.
#3: Bode Miller gets the bronze, but America doesn't care. NBC has tried to paint Bode Miller as the American dream, saying that everyone in our beautiful country is rooting for him to make a comeback, but that is hardly true. This boozing loser, who was proud to say that, although he didn't win a medal in Torino, he was glad to have "partied like an Olympian." Well, his amazing comeback bid fell short by NBC's standards, as he finished with the bronze in the downhill. Guess what Bode? Nobody outside of Lake Tahoe was rooting for you.
#4: The Chinese earn the gold in the pair figure skating. After watching most of the competition, this wasn't going to be a shock. I didn't actually get to watch their final outing onto the ice, but I think everyone knew that this would be the result on the podium after the competition. Shen Xue and her husband Zhao Hongbo banged out the gold medal win in the pairs figure skating, and the Americans failed to even sniff the podium. Amanda Evora and Mark Ladwig finished 10th in the standings, as China earned the silver and the Germans finished with the bronze. Hey, at least Russia finished fourth. Don't worry, ice dance is still on the way.
#5: Germany continues to dominate the luge. Just a little bit after the Germans gobbled up the gold in the men's luge, it was Tatjana Huefner's performance that gave German the women's luge gold as well. Are the Germans doing anything besides making quality sausages and practicing for Olympic luge? The medal was the ninth medal in 13 Olympics luge competitions for the Germans. Can you say dominant? Austria, which is basically Germany, won the silver, and Germany's Natalie Geisenberger took the bronze. The top American, Erin Hamlin, finished 16...and she was the 2009 World Champion.
LSF's "What 2 Watch 4 2night": Tonight's coverage gets a little thin on the big network. The tape delayed NBC primetime has Men's short program figure skating, snowboarding (cross, I think), and the women's medal round of the speed skating 500m (which should be really fun). However, CNBC helps out with the Canada/Norway Men's hockey match at 5 pm, and American/Norway curling taking us all the way until Midnight. Hockey and curling...is there anything better?
Medal Count: Germany has taken the lead, as you may have figured out from reading, with 9 total medals (3-4-2), while the US has dropped to second with 8 (2-2-4). Canada holds at third with 5 (2-2-1).
0 comments:
Post a Comment