Draft Day Suit

The University of Connecticut women’s basketball team has won an NCAA women’s record of wins with 71 games in a row. 71.

I haven’t won 71 anything in a row, ever, excluding managing to get out of bed 71 days in a row which I have to admit is sometimes a little iffy. Have you?

The Huskies have won every game – every game – since March 11, 2003, by double-digits – specifically an average of 32.5 points. Melanie Jackson at ESPN listed some of the most memorable games in the streak.

Coach Geno Auriemma says it’s good for their sport.

“You know, there’s people talking about women’s basketball now that wouldn’t be talking about it this time of year because of what we’re doing,’’ he said. “We have a way here at Connecticut of making everybody around the country talk about women’s basketball. We’ve been known to do that for a long time.’’

Auriemma keeps the Huskies, including star players Tina Charles and Maya Moore, focused on the championship, downplaying the milestone celebrations. I guess this is understandable, because what happens when you finally lose, if you ever do? Who wants to think about that?

They certainly don’t, but I’m sure the team that hopes to beat them does. Congratulate these players in the meantime. They may not be allowed to celebrate, but even this Maryland fan will give them a round of applause today.

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While my home team lost the gold medal in the men’s ice hockey final at the Vancouver Olympics, the game did serve one purpose.

It reminded me – along with millions of other people watching – why I love hockey.

You know how people say they love things like it’s their job? I could easily have a job loving hockey. A lifer Capitals fan who happily supported the late, possibly-lamented minor league Dayton Bombers when I lived in Ohio, one of the great joys of my life has been watching my home team rise to playoffs (and I believe Stanley Cup-contender) level since I’ve been back.

Today, while I rooted for Team USA to beat Canada in the Olympic gold medal game, I realized around about the middle of the second period when USA got off of its collective ass and made it a real contest that this is why people who love hockey so much know that it’s such a great game. This is why, no matter how much old-time hockey fans complain about bandwagons and newbie fans, I think it’s cool that so many people have been sucked in by a growing NHL and this well-played North American Olympic contest.

I got fired up. As a fan familiar with the varying tempos of games I felt the situation change from a back and forth snoozer to a toss-up in a way that got me up on the edge of my seat. I thought my team might have a win in them yet, and even if they didn’t it at least wouldn’t be a giveaway.

That feeling lasted through an exciting third period and a literally last-minute goal by Zach Parise that sent this already epic Olympic medal game into almost eight minutes of overtime until Sidney Crosby’s goal (she writes with great sadness) gave Canada the gold medal.

“A great player made a great play and found a way to finish us off tonight,” said U.S. head coach Ron Wilson. “I think both teams are winners, but more importantly I think tonight the game of hockey is the real winner.”

Both teams played a great game, but Canada won, fair and square, 3-2. We lost.

And perhaps most importantly to me, especially because my team lost so I’ve already had time to move on to the existential conclusion, hockey won.

I’m a sap and a sucker and I’m oddly pleased for Canada, although my required Caps fan disdain for Pittburgh Penguin Crosby makes me rather bitter about the vehicle.

(If you are new to all of this, just Google “Patrick Division NHL hockey” for the backstory on that. Also ask any hockey fan who is not from Pittsburgh, excluding the Canadians who are only now vowing not to talk smack about him ever again. I know at least one, and I believe she will crack in short order.)

Seriously, I believe in sports as a reflection of personal and local pride. In a classily-run and contested Olympic Games that saw its share of pain and loss, I think a hard-fought win for the host country in a sport that means so much there that it has its own national holiday is actually a beautiful thing.

As someone on Twitter said, a Canada loss would have been like the U.S. losing to Canada in football.

But for a few minutes there, there was that amazing Parise goal that put U.S. goalie Ryan Miller back into the net where he belongs and took it to overtime. My Twitter stream blew up. I exploded out of my chair and screamed in my living room.

And I said, “This is why I love hockey,” once I sat down and stopped screaming.

It is a maddening game and it can make you crazy if you care about it, really. It moves so fast. It’s  high-pressure and it can turn on a dime. It’s excellent if you’re into that sort of thing, and once you do get into it, just try to quit it, I dare you.

And on many occasions in my life when I’ve been watching great hockey, I know there’s nothing like it, and it’s just cool to enjoy something that much. The two U.S. – Canada games at the Olympics really were some of the most exciting hockey I’ve ever seen.

In the end the U.S. was the only team in this Olympics that was undefeated in regulation. Miller was named the MVP of the tournament, deservedly so, with 36 saves. The guys on both sides will head back to their NHL locker rooms today, while I bet a lot of Canadians are calling in sick from the looks of the streets in Vancouver after the game.

As for my team, they play the Sabres on Wednesday, so I’m hoping Buffalo gives Miller the week off. Otherwise I’m going to be a little confused, and more than a little nervous. He may have let the last one in, but this guy knows how to stop a puck.

Congratulations, Canada. Well-played, USA.

[Photos courtesy of Reuters]

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A guest post from Alison at Chatty Cricket.

I love the Olympics. So much.

I really was hell bent on writing about the drama that becomes the stuff of Legends at the Winter Olympics (Italian Ice Dancing Death stares in Torino! Jonny Moseley and his amazing Never Ending Dinner Roll! ALBERTO TOMBA). Like, remember last time when Lindsey Jacobellis decided to show off during her winning snowboard cross and then LOST her gold medal spot and OH MY GOD CHILD, what was WITH the HOT DOGGING?!  But as I’ve been watching the 2010 Winter Olympics lo these last two weeks, I’ve been stuck on exactly how to capture the drama. To do it justice. The legendary bitch face (Barbara Fusar-Poli, I’m looking at you. But now I’m looking away because YOU SCARE ME), the gold medal promise that never was (ahem, Bode Miller. Way to rebound there in Vancouver, dude), The Jamaican Bobsled team (you guys, Jamaican Me CRAZY. In a good way)…..and yet, despite all of this amazing material, the post wouldn’t come.

I think it’s because this year, with my three children and my fourth on the way, I cannot get past the Parent Factor. These Olympics in particular have been tugging at my heartstrings left and right. I find myself completely unable to stop watching these games AS A MOTHER. Perhaps it’s because of Proctor & Gamble and their salutations to all of the mothers (and fathers) out there who sacrificed, and encouraged, and supported on the way to helping their children reach their ultimate goals, or even just on the way to letting their kids have a whole bunch of fun playing the sports they love. At five o’clock in the morning. An hour away from the house. Uphill both ways. Maybe it’s because every time the Olympics are on, no matter what sport, my three year old grabs the nearest pirate sword/ruler/drumstick and ball/lego/magnet and starts a pickup game of hockey complete with an imaginary team of players that he encourages to “Skate faster buddy! you can do it” It could be that these Olympians keep getting younger and younger, while I stay exactly the same and do not age at all.

I’m not sure.

As the skiers wipe out, I think OH MY GOD, it is a good thing you are WEARING YOUR HELMET.

As the skaters twirl around backwards and do their loopty spins, I think, YOUNG LADY we need to get you more coverage if you are going to be skating ass first like that. And then I get teary and clappy when they finish their hard fought routines.

I hop up and down out of my seat cheering for Apolo Anton Ohno who may not be crossing the finish for gold, but is setting an Olympic record for medals won in a sport so volatile that even a skater at his level may not medal at all if it’s not his night. And then I think of his Dad who encouraged him to find a sport he loved, and who as a single parent raised a son so mature and determined and focused and GRACIOUS that it makes me hope that I can somehow raise children as grounded. His father must be so proud.

And then that makes me think about Shaun White who isn’t only a kick ass snowboard trickster, but an innovator. Did you know he built his own mad science lab of a half pipe in a secluded location so that he can get away from everyone and cook up all sorts of insane new tricks? I didn’t know that until the other night. And DAMN, but that’s impressive. He is 24 years old. At 24 years old I was someone’s lowly assistant flattered for the chance to share an idea in a client meeting. Shaun White is working on ways to revolutionize his sport. I’m impressed.

It takes a special parent to recognize a talent and a passion in a child and to help foster that interest into something that can be a life fulfilling experience. We get to see a lot of the best of that on display during the Olympics. It ALSO takes a pretty special parent to be able to help their children recognize their own particular strengths without blowing smoke, so to the parents of these elite athletes, I say kudos.

Also, could like a bunch of you get together and write a step by step guide to raising an incredibly confident and well grounded Olympian? Someone needs to balance the Lynne Spears book movement is what I’m saying.

Alison obsesses over parenting and sometimes what to cook and/or to do with the house at ChattyCricket. She has three kids aged 4 and under and is expecting her fourth in June, so you should cut her some slack because she is very tired and only sort of paying attention to what you are saying, you understand. Frankly, she can barely hear you over the yelling. Actually, can she talk to you when they go down for naps?

About halfway through the men’s Olympic ice skating short program, my husband looked up from his laptop and said, “This is so subjective it’s not even funny.”

At the time, I argued that it wasn’t as subjective as he thought, since clearly the skaters are rated on required elements that definitely have a proper way to be performed. After a few days of thought, I concede that figure skating is quite subjective in comparison to many of the other winter sports. There’s not much need for opinion in speedskating or cross-country skiing, for instance. Apolo Ohno either crosses the line first or he doesn’t; Johnny Spillane either lays down the second-best finishing time or he doesn’t. This subjectivity combined with the new scoring system can make it hard for the average viewer to figure out what’s going on with the judging. I’m still trying to figure out how Johnny Weir placed behind both Patrick Chan and Stephane Lambiel.

I find I’m not much for the frippery and froufery of skating. Wave your arms around as gracefully as you want and bedazzle your shirt to within an inch of its life if you please, but I’m still going to find that I want to watch the jumpers and spinners. That said, I admit a little bit of presentation is really necessary. The guys who are only good jumpers do as little for me as the ones who are graceful as all get out but can’t land a lutz. My favorite skaters this year were France’s Florent Amodio and the Japanese trio of Daisuke Takahashi, Nobunari Oda, and Takahiko Kozuka. All four are compact, speedy jumpers with just the right amount of showmanship.

Of course, the big story now that it’s all over is silver medalist Evgeny Plushenko’s less-than-gracious behavior toward gold medalist Evan Lysacek. Now, there’s no doubt that Plushenko is one of the best jumpers in the sport, maybe even the best. He lands a quadruple toe loop in combination, which no other competitor did during this Olympics. Apparently Plushenko has complained that Lysacek won on artistic rather than athletic merits. Surprisingly, even though Lysacek’s program was much more fluid and heartfelt, the two contenders earned identical artistic marks in the long program.

To my admittedly untrained eye, it seemed clear that Lysacek skated a superior program on the final night. His jumps were spot-on, his footwork and spins were precise, and he skated with passion. Plushenko, on the other hand, executed his jumps but didn’t seem to infuse his routine with any joy at all. Granted, there’s probably no mark for enthusiasm, but let’s be honest. In figure skating, showmanship counts nearly as much as being able to land a triple flip. If you go out onto the ice and skate like the medal is owed to you, don’t be surprised when it’s given to someone who skated instead like he wanted to win it on his own terms. For all his impressive and well-earned victories of the past, Plushenko showed a sad and distinct lack of sportsmanship in Vancouver – and that was before he awarded himself a platinum medal.

If he does skate for gold again at the 2014 Games, let’s hope he brings a bit more humility and fire to the ice.

Velocibadgergirl’s skating experience is limited to doing a lot of rollerblading in middle school, being able to skate carefully around and around on an ice rink without falling down, and watching several Olympics’ worth of figure skating competitions (bouts? matches?). She lives in the Midwest with her husband, baby son, and handsome dog, and blogs at Pardon the Egg Salad.