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For the first time in 12 years, Olympic hockey will feature the best of the best.
National Hockey League players were first allowed to play in the Winter Olympics in 1998, but that took a pause following the 2014 Games.
Prior to NHLers playing, the United States teams were mostly filled with college and amateur stars, all while facing pros from other countries. It’s precisely why the “Miracle on Ice” is called exactly that — with a little help from Al Michaels, of course.
In 2018 and 2022, the NHL again barred current players from competing, but the league reversed course for next month’s competition.
Jim Craig, the goaltender from that 1980 USA team, is all for bringing the pros in.
“As long as the playing field is equal, why not have the best athletes in the world be competing against each other? You have the very best playing for each other,” Craig told Fox News Digital in a recent interview.
However, with every athlete having a separate responsibility of building their own brand, Craig wants each player this year to go in with the same mentality that he and his teammates had.
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“I just hope that they have that same commitment that the amateurs had, right? That what’s the most important thing isn’t their brand, or where they play. It’s about representing their country, and it’s not about themselves,” Craig said. “That’s what I’m really proud of our teammates that we were able to do. It wasn’t about who’s going to get the best contract, where are you going, how much money are you going to make? It was about what was really important, and that’s representing your country.”
For Craig, the 4 Nations Face-Off proved as such.
“You can be politically correct all you want, but you can see how unpolitically correct those teams were,” Craig said with a laugh. “Canada wanted to win, and the USA wanted to win, and you can even see the way that Canada has picked their team [this year]. I mean, their team now isn’t just the greatest athletes. It’s an ingredient of things that it’s going to take to beat the United States.
“They’re tougher, there’s players that, like Herb [Brooks] said, ‘I’m not looking for the best players, I’m looking for the right players.’ I really think now when they go into the Olympic Games, it isn’t who the highest scorer is. They’re really looking for something that’s going to be helping them win, and that’s something Herb did a long time ago.”
Men’s hockey will begin on Feb. 12, with the gold medal game taking place 10 days later — 46 years to the day the Americans defeated the Soviets.
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