Canada’s Olympic hockey teams are coming into focus
The first hockey games at the Beijing Winter Olympics take place exactly three weeks from today. Here’s the latest on the two Canadian teams:
Women’s
After delaying the announcement by a few weeks due to COVID-19 cases on the team, Canada finally revealed its 23-player Olympic roster yesterday afternoon. The most notable of the final three cuts was veteran defenceman Meaghan Mikkelson, who’d been trying to make it to her fourth Olympics after having knee surgery in June.
Captain/overtime magician Marie-Philip Poulin and fellow forward Rebecca Johnston will compete in their fourth Olympics, and go for their third gold medal, as Canada looks to avenge its 2018 shootout loss to the archrival United States. The Canadians turned the tables at the world championship last summer in Calgary, snapping the Americans’ run of five consecutive titles when Poulin (who else?) scored in overtime in the final. Ten Canadians are set to make their Olympic debuts in Beijing.
Like a lot of Canada’s Olympic athletes right now, the women’s hockey team is laying low in an effort to avoid COVID-19 infections, which could jeopardize a player’s eligibility for the Games. The squad is bubbled together in Calgary and, after several players tested positive last month, the decision was made to not play any more games before Beijing. The final three dates of the Rivalry Series tour vs. the U.S. were cancelled, as was this week’s matchup vs. an Alberta Junior Hockey League men’s team.
Canada’s first Olympic game is Feb. 2 at 11:10 p.m. ET vs. Switzerland. Then it faces 2018 bronze medallist Finland on Feb. 3, Russia on Feb. 6 and the U.S. on Feb. 7 (all at 11:10 p.m. ET). All five teams in this group automatically advance to the quarter-finals, so these games are just about determining seeding. The playoff rounds begin on the night of Feb. 10 (ET), and culminate with the gold-medal game on Feb. 16 at 11:10 p.m. ET.
It’s highly likely that Canada and the U.S. will square off for gold for the sixth time in the seven Olympics since women’s hockey joined the program. That matchup would, as usual, be a toss-up. Read more about the Canadian roster here. Read analyst Kirsten Whelan’s position-by-position breakdown here.
Men’s
It’s been three weeks since the NHL and its players officially bailed on Beijing, and we still don’t know who’s going to play for Canada. Based on the 2018 Olympics, which the NHL also skipped, we can assume the roster will be made up largely of guys who play for European clubs (especially in the Russia-based KHL), plus a few from the AHL (North America’s top minor league) and even the NCAA (U.S. colleges/universities). Four years ago, the leading scorers on Canada’s bronze-winning team were Maxim Noreau, who was playing in the Swiss league, and Derek Roy, who’d moved to the Swedish league after a long career in the NHL. Canada’s top goalie was former NHL journeyman Ben Scrivens.
This year’s team is being picked by new general manager Shane Doan, the former Phoenix/Arizona Coyotes forward who stepped in to replace Doug Armstrong when the NHL withdrew. Former Montreal Canadiens and Boston Bruins head coach Claude Julien will be behind the bench.
Probably the biggest name they’re thought to be considering is six-time NHL all-star Eric Staal. The 37-year-old forward is currently not playing for anyone after helping Montreal to the Stanley Cup final last year, but Staal’s agent says he’s been working out and wants to play in the Olympics. His resumé is impressive: 1,034 points (including 441 goals) in 1,293 NHL regular-season games, plus a Stanley Cup with Carolina in 2005 and Olympic gold in 2010.
Another interesting player is 19-year-old Owen Power, who’s reportedly a lock for the Canadian team. The No. 1 overall pick in last year’s NHL draft opted to play another season at the University of Michigan and lit up the world junior championship in December, scoring a hat trick in one of the two games Canada played before the tournament was cancelled. Power also played against grown men at last year’s world championship, recording three assists in 10 games to help Canada win gold.
Among the recognizable ex-NHLers also reported to be under consideration for the team are forwards Eric Fehr and Josh Ho-Sang, defencemen Jason Demers and Cody Franson, and goalie Devan Dubnyk.
When NHLers were expected to play, Canada was favoured to win gold. Now the betting markets have defending-champion Russia as the clear No. 1, and Canada part of a following pack with Finland and Sweden. Those countries, like Russia, have solid domestic leagues.
Canada’s first game is Feb. 10 at 8:10 a.m. ET vs. Germany, which surprised everyone in 2018 by making it to the gold-medal game and nearly upsetting Russia before losing in OT. Canada then faces the U.S. on Feb. 11 at 11:10 p.m. ET, and wraps up the group stage vs. China on Feb. 13 at 8:10 a.m. ET.
Everyone in the men’s tournament advances to the playoffs, but the winner of each of the three groups and the top second-place team advance directly to the quarter-finals. The rest must survive a one-game qualification playoff to join them. Those games are on Feb. 14 and 15 in Canadian time zones, and the quarters on Feb. 15 and 16. The gold-medal game is Feb. 19 at 11:10 p.m. ET.
Canada’s women hockey team for Beijing Winter Games unveiled
23 hours ago
Duration 2:01
Canada’s women’s hockey team for the upcoming Beijing Winter Games has been unveiled, but before the players can face off against their U.S. rivals they have some COVID-19 hurdles to overcome. 2:01
Quickly…
The Novak Djokovic saga took another twist. The world No. 1 is still on track to play in the Australian Open starting next week after a judge on Monday overturned (on procedural grounds) the decision by border officials to revoke Djokovic’s visa because they felt his exemption to the country’s vaccination requirement for foreign visitors was invalid. However, Australia’s immigration minister has the power to deport Djokovic, and he may choose to wield it after the tennis star appears to have been caught in both a lie and some careless behaviour. Part of Djokovic’s argument for not needing to be vaccinated against COVID-19 to enter Australia is that he claims he recently recovered from the illness, and thus has some natural immunity. But reporters discovered that, at the time Djokovic claimed to have been infected (and knew so), he did an interview and photo shoot in his native Serbia while not wearing a mask. Reports also pointed out that Djokovic’s claim to Australian officials that he did not travel for 14 days prior to his flight to Melbourne is untrue based on social-media posts placing him in Serbia and in Spain during that period. Djokovic admitted via written statement today that he made an “error in judgement” by doing the interview when he was infected. He blamed the inaccurate travel declaration on his support team for “ticking the incorrect box” on his form. Read more about the latest in the Djokovic controversy here.
And finally…
The NHL had a Kodak moment. Last night in South Florida, the Panthers beat the visiting Canucks 5-2 to stay atop the Presidents’ Trophy race with an NHL-best 24-7-5 record. But everybody on the internet is talking about the real story from the arena, which of course was Florida’s Sam Reinhart racking up three points to continue his breakthrough season. I’m kidding, obviously. Everyone knows the big story was actually Panthers star Jonathan Huberdeau chipping in an assist to stay in the thick of the Art Ross Trophy race. And also, yeah, I guess this was interesting too.
PARIS (AP) — French judicial authorities are investigating the disappearance of two Paralympic athletes from Congo who recently competed in the Paris Games, the prosecutor’s office in the Paris suburb of Bobigny confirmed on Thursday.
Prosecutors opened the investigation on Sept. 7, after members of the athletes’ delegation warned authorities of their disappearance two days before.
Le Parisien newspaper reported that shot putter Mireille Nganga and Emmanuel Grace Mouambako, a visually impaired sprinter who was accompanied by a guide, went missing on Sept. 5, along with a third person.
The athletes’ suitcases were also gone but their passports remained with the Congolese delegation, according to an official with knowledge of the investigation, who asked to remain anonymous as they were not allowed to speak publicly about the case.
The Paralympic Committee of the Democratic Republic of Congo did not respond to requests for information from The Associated Press.
Nganga — who recorded no mark in the seated javelin and shot put competitions — and Mouambako were Congo’s flag bearers at the opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games, organizers said.
An investigator gave the World Anti-Doping Agency a pass on its handling of the inflammatory case involving Chinese swimmers, but not without hammering away at the “curious” nature of WADA’s “silence” after examining Chinese actions that did not follow rules designed to safeguard global sports.
WADA on Thursday released the full decision from Eric Cottier, the Swiss investigator it appointed to analyze its handling of the case involving the 23 Chinese swimmers who remained eligible despite testing positive for performance enhancers in 2021.
In echoing wording from an interim report issued earlier this summer, Cottier said it was “reasonable” that WADA chose not to appeal the Chinese anti-doping agency’s explanation that the positives came from contamination.
“Taking into consideration the particularities of the case, (WADA) appears … to have acted in accordance with the rules it has itself laid out for anti-doping organizations,” Cottier wrote.
But peppered throughout his granular, 56-page analysis of the case was evidence and reminders of how WADA disregarded some of China’s violations of anti-doping protocols. Cottier concluded this happened more for the sake of expediency than to show favoritism toward the Chinese.
“In retrospect at least, the Agency’s silence is curious, in the face of a procedure that does not respect the fundamental rules, and its lack of reaction is surprising,” Cottier wrote of WADA’s lack of fealty to the world anti-doping code.
Travis Tygart, the CEO of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency and one of WADA’s fiercest critics, latched onto this dynamic, saying Cottier’s information “clearly shows that China did not follow the rules, and that WADA management did nothing about it.”
One of the chief complaints over the handling of this case was that neither WADA nor the Chinese gave any public notice upon learning of the positive tests for the banned heart medication Temozolomide, known as TMZ.
The athletes also were largely kept in the dark and the burden to prove their innocence was taken up by Chinese authorities, not the athletes themselves, which runs counter to what the rulebook demands.
Despite the criticisms, WADA generally welcomed the report.
“Above all, (Cottier) reiterated that WADA showed no bias towards China and that its decision not to appeal the cases was reasonable based on the evidence,” WADA director general Olivier Niggli said. “There are however certainly lessons to be learned by WADA and others from this situation.”
Tygart said “this report validates our concerns and only raises new questions that must be answered.”
Cottier expanded on doubts WADA’s own chief scientist, Olivier Rabin, had expressed over the Chinese contamination theory — snippets of which were introduced in the interim report. Rabin was wary of the idea that “a few micrograms” of TMZ found in the kitchen at the hotel where the swimmers stayed could be enough to cause the group contamination.
“Since he was not in a position to exclude the scenario of contamination with solid evidence, he saw no other solution than to accept it, even if he continued to have doubts about the reality of contamination as described by the Chinese authorities,” Cottier wrote.
Though recommendations for changes had been expected in the report, Cottier made none, instead referring to several comments he’d made earlier in the report.
Key among them were his misgivings that a case this big was largely handled in private — a breach of custom, if not the rules themselves — both while China was investigating and after the file had been forwarded to WADA. Not until the New York Times and German broadcaster ARD reported on the positives were any details revealed.
“At the very least, the extraordinary nature of the case (23 swimmers, including top-class athletes, 28 positive tests out of 60 for a banned substance of therapeutic origin, etc.), could have led to coordinated and concerted reflection within the Agency, culminating in a formal and clearly expressed decision to take no action,” the report said.
WADA’s executive committee established a working group to address two more of Cottier’s criticisms — the first involving what he said was essentially WADA’s sloppy recordkeeping and lack of formal protocol, especially in cases this complex; and the second a need to better flesh out rules for complex cases involving group contamination.
The French league’s legal commission has ordered Paris Saint-Germain to pay Kylian Mbappé the 55 million euros ($61 million) in unpaid wages that he claims he’s entitled to, the league said Thursday.
The league confirmed the decision to The Associated Press without more details, a day after the France superstar rejected a mediation offer by the commission in his dispute with his former club.
