Latvia! Turino! Chelios!

I think- when this Olympic hockey tournament is over- we will all look back at this imminently forgettable3-3 tie with Latvia as emblematic of the 2006 USA team.

I mean, it isn’t exactly a bad tie. Latvia carries shorter odds to win the tournament than the USA at William Hill in the UK. This is not a great USA team- and they managed to claw out a point despite being down a goal entering the third period. Latvia has played together for weeks- and looked it. The United States was ragged- particularly in its own end- indicative of a team that just practiced once.

But it wasn’t a satisfying tie either. The US blew an early two goal lead- mainly by being ill-disciplined on the blue line. For a team that can’t skate at a world class level, Latvia had an awful lot of odd-man rushes. They took a bunch of lazy penalties. And of course, Latvia is not a member of the “Big Six”- a group the United States is a member of- so no result short of a win is going to be rewarding.

Ultimately, this game brought into distinct focus all the things that make this a weak American team. For example, John Grahame did not play all that badly. He made nineteen stops. But you like to think your top national goalie is an elite player- frankly able to hold Latvia to under three goals when facing twenty or shots. And the Americans can’t roll lines of pure offensive firepower (like Canada) or a real elite singular offensive player (like Jagr) out there to compensate for the lack to team play. Consequently, a guy like Irbe can play a decent game between the pipes and make the United States feel lucky to get three markers.

The USA was able to steal some championships and success in the last generation of players due to the presence of an elite goalie (Mike Richter) and the fact they had eight-ten elite forwards that could punish a team that was prone to playing its worst in the biggest spots (Canada) or that lacked similar depth upfront (the Czechs and Russians).

Frankly, you can’t win this tournament getting off the bus with a handful of world class players, a defense where Chris Chelios is one of the better players and Grahame as your stopper. They ought to make the medal round- but then they are looking at an ugly first round game that they probably can’t win at this point.