Canada breaks a 50-year-old Russian curse

Fifty years.

The memory plays tricks on us, because of World Cups and Canada Cups and world juniors and all kinds of hockey games and titles Canada has won that mattered very little in the grand scheme of things to the Russians — whose grand scheme is, and always has been, the Olympics.

Russia, by any other name — Soviet Union or Commonwealth of Independent States or Unified Team — has happily traded losses in lesser theatres for the opportunity to break Canada’s heart on the big stage.

And they’ve been doing it for 50 years.

But not to this group of Canadians, they haven’t.

"We won a quarter-final here, and it happened to be against Russia, and we move forward," said Sidney Crosby, who was a lot more into the win than the opponent.

Until the 7-3 thrashing the Canadians administered Wednesday, the Russians hadn’t lost an Olympic hockey game to Canada since 1960.

But for most of the players on this team, Crosby included, Russia is just a country they have beaten with regularity, for years. To all the under-25s on Team Canada, who have never faced Russia in an Olympic Games — because that matchup has only happened once since the NHL joined the Olympic movement for real in 1998 — the guys in the red uniforms Wednesday evening were a lot of the same ones Canada has made look bad in a series of world junior championships dating back to 2005.

"It’s going to be one country’s game," Canadian head coach Mike Babcock said, "but we try to prove on a regular basis that it’s ours. I’m a bit of a redneck. I think it’s ours."

So the rivalry exists, these days, more in the hearts and memories of fans and media than in fact — but it does exist. Ask the crazies in the sea of red inside Canada Hockey Place, waving flags of both countries and chanting for their heroes in English and Russian.

The wins are still as sweet, and the losses as bitter.

Which maybe explains the Russian team’s GM, Vladisalv Tretiak, pacing in the hallway outside his team’s dressing room, nearly 90 minutes before the puck dropped. Even the great Tretiak could feel the tension of a loser-goes-home quarter-final.

The tension didn’t last long. From the first shift, Babcock’s Canadians left nothing to chance — won every puck battle, leaned on the Russian defence, punished Alex Ovechkin, punctured goalie Evgeni Nabokov’s bubble — and by the 13-minute mark, the only issue unresolved was the extent of the beating.

The Russians, for all their spectacular talent up front, and the extra days of rest, were no match for the Canadians’ level of desire in the first period — and the first period was the game.

"It was a very strong team today playing against us, and we couldn’t withstand the pressure," said Russian coach Vyacheslav Bykov. "We tried to play different ways, but everything failed."

"We knew we had a great team, and had all kinds of confidence in the room," said forward Eric Staal, though he admitted to being "maybe a little bit" surprised by the final score.

"We came after them right away. We were kind of at the boiling point as soon as the puck dropped, and we were really firing, and obviously the atmosphere was awesome and that adds to it. It was a lot of fun out there."

They took their cue from the line of Jonathan Toews, Mike Richards and Rick Nash — who created countless turnovers and one very pretty Nash goal, Canada’s third — and from defenceman Shea Weber, whose persistent battering of Ovechkin seemed to leave a mark on all the Russian skill players, few of whom were much in evidence during the game. Or in the interview area afterwards.

Like Evgeni Plushenko, they’re taking their pouts and going home.

And with each Canadian goal — including the first by Ryan Getzlaf and two from his line-mate Corey Perry — the crowd got louder.

"We always talk about Canada-Russia and the rivalry, but you feel it more than ever in this building," said Crosby. "We came out energized, and part of that was the crowd, but we went after them from the start."

"We know how good we are," said defenceman Brent Seabrook.

"The goal was to get better every game of the tournament, and for the most part we’ve done that.

"We’ve had some bumps in the road, but we’ve learned from our mistakes."

Getzlaf sounded the cautionary note, considering there is another sudden-death game coming up against the Sweden-Slovakia winner before Canada can even ponder the championship game.

"Momentum changes from game to game," said the big centre.

Still, it is a remarkable pattern. It took 50 years after the Edmonton Mercurys did it in 1952 for Canada to win another gold medal, though they didn’t beat the Russians en route. And it took 50 years after the Kitchener-Waterloo team did it in 1960 for Canada to win another game from the Russians, though the Americans won the gold in Squaw Valley.

The mission, then, is to try to do both in the same tournament. On home ice.

They’re one big step closer today.