I suppose many of us expected all along that the U.S. and Canada would meet in the Sochi Olympics. Too bad that only the women will face off for a gold medal Thursday while the men will have to settle for a semifinal match Friday.
But while the American and Canadian men's teams moved on in Wednesday's quarterfinals, Russia was eliminated by Finland 3-1 and Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov was given the hook in the second period after allowing all three goals on 15 shots.
The Avalanche will have its first team practice Thursday since its 5-2 win against the New York Islanders on Feb. 8 to begin a mini training camp for the resumption of the NHL season. The Avalanche will play the first of its final 24 games next Wednesday against the Los Angeles Kings at the Pepsi Center.
Not sure when Varlamov will return to Colorado, but you have to hope that Russia's disappointing performance in the Olympics won't affect him in a negative way. He was good enough in his first game when he stopped 12 of 14 shots in a 5-2 win against Slovenia, and he was exceptional in a 1-0 shootout win against Slovakia, turning aside 27 shots before stopping both Slovakian shooters in the tiebreaker.
Varlamov certainly wasn't at his best against Finland, but neither was Russia's defense.
"It's not necessary to say that the goalkeeper played bad,'' Russian defenseman Anton Belov told reporters. "It was mistakes by the defense and team.''
Finland scored twice in the first period for a 2-1 lead. Juhamatti Aaltonen tied the game with a shot from a sharp angle and Teemu Selanne converted Mikael Granlund's pass on a 2-on-1 rush. Granlund knocked in the rebound of Selanne's shot for a power-play goal to complete the scoring in the second period.
Russia coach Zinetula Bilyaletdinov replaced Varlamov with Sergei Bobrovsky a little later in the period and the Columbus Blue Jackets goalie stopped all seven shots he faced.
Bilyaletdinov is getting plenty of criticism for starting Varlamov rather than the Vezina Trophy-winning Bobrovsky, who played so well in Saturday's 3-2 shootout loss to the U.S., but there's plenty of blame to go around for a Russian team whose offense accounted for seven goals in the final four games despite the presence of Pavel Datsyuk, Ilya Kovalchuk, Evgeni Malkin, Alex Ovechkin and Alexander Semin.
But we all know how much these Games meant to Varlamov, who so looked forward to playing in his native country.
"It has always been my dream to play in the Olympics and in the NHL, so it's huge," Varlamov said after being named to the team. "It's going to be so much fun to play back in Russia in front of your fans, in front of your family and friends. I can't wait. I'm so excited. I was nervous because you never know.
"There's maybe going to be more pressure playing in Russia in front of your fans, in front of your Russian president, but it's going to be so much fun to play at home."
Until Wednesday, it was.
Let's hope Varlamov will manage to put this disappointment behind him for the Avalanche's stretch run. He's been the team's most valuable player up to this point, and he'll need to play the way he did before the Olympic break for the Avalanche to nail down a playoff berth and have some success after that.
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Avalanche forwards Paul Stastny and Gabriel Landeskog weren't major factors in their respective teams' wins Wednesday, but at least they got to play. Matt Duchene was a healthy scratch for Canada's surprisingly difficult 2-1 win against Latvia, but I assume he'll play Friday because John Tavares sustained a leg injury and will miss the remainder of the tournament.
Stastny played just 10:15 in the 5-2 win against the Czech Republic, didn't have a shot on goal and lost seven of nine faceoffs. He did some good things defensively but still finished a minus-1. Only Blake Wheeler (all 1:39 in the third period) and defenseman John Carlson (9:13) logged fewer minutes than Stastny on the U.S. team.
Landeskog had two shots and one minor penalty in Sweden's 5-0 win against Slovenia.