Sunday, February 28, 2010

Hockey, Canada and the Olympics

I really enjoyed the Winter Olympics this year and found myself more tuned into the games than I have been in the past.

After the tragic beginning with the death of Nodar Kumaritashvili, I was unable to watch any luge, bobsled, skeleton or any sport on that track without cringing. It was just too sad.

Hockey, while I didn't watch a ton of the games, was what I was most aware of thanks to my husband's obsession. When the U.S. beat the Canadian team I was in shock and had such high hopes for our team.

Today, those dreams were crushed as Sidney Crosby, Canada's Golden Boy, brings them to victory once again. The U.S. players and goalie Ryan Miller really had a go at victory though, tying the game in the last 25 seconds of regulation play. It was an exciting game to say the least, but in the end Canada won.

The thing that bothered me the most was how much time the announcers and the camera man spent praising Crosby for his overtime goal win when he hadn't had a single point in the past two games before this. The camera was literally fixed on Crosby's face during the entire celebration on the ice, which I felt was unfair to the rest of the Canadian team. The TEAM won the gold medal, not just Sidney Crosby.

So now I am being bored to death by the closing ceremonies as I watch this, I watched the entire opening ceremonies just two weeks ago.

One interesting article I read was how the olympics in Vancouver have been one blunder after another, including death, bad weather, mistake during opening ceremonies etc. I found it interesting. Why the Olympics Have Been Bad for Canada.

Now I'm not saying the olympics were a bad thing for Canada, it brought them so many great things. The article just brought up things I didn't always notice.

One thing I hated about this olympics was NBC's covereage of it. Sports that were originally scheduled to be on one channel, ended up on another channel. Rarely was a sport actually live (for the west coast) and there was a tape delay for the west coast. What gives?! Finally we have an event in OUR TIME ZONE and we don't get to see anything in real time. Absolutely ridiculous.

So the olympics is over now, I am sad that I did not visit Vancouver as two of Mike's friends did, but I do hope to visit a Winter Olympics sometime in the future. I hear it is an experience not to be missed.

No comments: