It's been over twenty years since Russia last won Olympic gold in men's hockey. Sochi seems as good of a place as any to snap this particulary drought, though even with potential home-ice advantage working in their favor, the Russians will be working a bit uphill as they look to take down some formidable international powers.
While Russia's far from the prohibitive favorite in the competition, their offense alone makes them one of the three favorites to earn some sort of medal. It's unclear whether or not the injured Pavel Datsyuk will be ready to go in time for the team's first game -- Datysuk and teammates suggest he will be in the lineup when the team opens up on Thursday, but nothing is confirmed just yet.
Assuming Datsyuk's in, their forward combinations are truly something to behold:
L1: Ovechkin-Malkin-Semin L2: Radulov-Datsyuk-Kovalchuk L3: Tarasenko-Anisimov-Kulemin L4: Popov-Tereschenko/Svitov-Tikhonov
As far as a top-nine goes, that's an unbelievable assortment of possession-drivers and snipers. Malkin/Datsyuk give the team a terrifying look down the middle, and the wingers -- from Ovechkin to Semin, from Kovalchuk down to Tarasenko and Kulemin on the team's checking line -- are Grade A.
It's figured that Russia will be in the business of goal-scoring -- it's quite possible that by tournament end, they'll have finished with the most potent offense assembled.
So, what's precisely stopping them from the gold medal? Similar to Team USA, their forward combinations look a lot stronger than their defensive pairings. This is how they lined up on Monday afternoon on the back-end:
Markov-Voynov Belov-Nikitin Nikulin-Tyutin Emelin-Medvedev
It's ... OK. That's a bit complementary for a medal-hopeful, to be honest. Slava Voynov is really worth the price of admission, and Andrei Markov -- even at the age of thirty-five -- is one of the better blue-line passers in the business. Fedor Tyutin has logged many a shift against the league's best, and you know head coach Zinetula Bilyaletdinov will ride him in the tougher minutes.
But, collectively, it's pretty underwhelming. There are plenty of NHL'ers in that mix, but considering the age of some and the youth of others, it pales in comparison to what a lot of other teams will be bringing.
Thankfully, or perhaps hopefully, the Russians will have the goaltending to bail out the defense when things get a bit testy. The pair of Semyon Varlamov and Sergei Bobrovsky give Russia two guys who can stop pucks at a fantastic rate. Varlamov was actually a member of the 2010 Vancouver team, working behind Evgeni Nabokov and Ilya Bryzgalov.
The 2010 Vancouver team -- that's a team that the Russians are trying to erase from their memory. Russia went 2-0-1 through group play, earning a first-round bye. Unfortunately, due to the way the formatting worked, they drew Canada in the Quarterfinals. Final score: Canad 7, Russia 3.
It was a complete, sixty-minute collapse, and they've had four years to stew over what should've been a legitimate run at an Olympic medal on Canada's home turf. You can expect they're looking to redeem themselves after such a poor showing, though their group -- including the United States, Slovakia, and Slovenia -- offer quite a mini-gauntlet early on.
It's hard to envision many teams slowing down the Russian forwards, but it's also fairly easy to see other supremely talented teams having their way with a rather mediocre defensive group.
With Russia, and this is likely the case for a lot of teams, it may come down to goaltending. It's not clear who the choice will be between Varlamov and Bobrovsky -- Tretiak noted the decision was still up in the air, and you might even see a timeshare during the group play stage.
Big spot. Big pressure. Talented team. Will Russia rise to the occasion, or crumble to Western European and North American powers?
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