It Was A Good Day To Be A Blueshirt

To each his own, I say. All things considered,  that battle for the Gold was the best game of hockey I've ever seen.

Ever! 

Had I known what was up, I probably would have ordered a portable oxygen tank; then again, I should have known. 

This primarily is a Rangers column so let's get to our Blueshirt pals who've been hammered plenty this dismaying season.

Chris Drury and Mike Sullivan helped create the gold medal-winning lineup and Sully waved the baton. The tubas, bass men, trombonists all did their thing, including Vin Trocheck and J.T. Miller.

"We took the ball and ran with it," said Trocheck, who neatly meshed gears with J.T.  They weren't the superstars but they did their thing; defusing the Canadian marquee guys but especially Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon and that crazy-good San Jose kid, Macklin Celebrini.

This was the melodrama of all melodramas; the irresistible force vs. the  immovables from America. The irresistibles fired 42 shots at Connor Hellebuyck of Commerce, Michigan and he only missed one.

The Canadians treated Uncle Sam's goalie as if they had a lease on his crease and when Cal Makar tied the game late in the second, it looked like "Taps" would have to be played – instead of the Star-Spangled Banner at game's end.

I mean how could the Canucks blow a five-on-three power play that ran for almost two full minutes? How does "The Great McDavid" blow a clean breakaway? Or Celebrini?"

And when the game went to overtime, three-on-three, perfect for the supposedly perfect McDavid – it was poor "Never Win A Cup, Never Win A Gold" McDavid watching Happy Jack Hughes leaving him in the dust along with the very underrated Zach Werenski of Grosse Pointe, Michigan.

Zach got the Pointe, all right. His radar pass found Happy Hughes' stick so neatly you could almost hear the blade laughing.

Goalie Jonathan Binnington might as well have been home in Richmond Hill, Ontario for all his skill could do for him.

That shot was soooooo good, I wouldn't doubt that Poor Jonny is still on the lookout for it.

Never mind the whys and wherefores: the better team won the Gold for the best possible reason; Uncle Sam 2, Johnny Canuck, 1.

It was that complicatedly simple; the greatest game The Maven ever saw!