Czech Republic's Martin Rucinsky celebrates after scoring against U.S. Olympic goaltender Mike Richter as Doug Weight(19) and Derian Hatcher(3) during second period quarter-final Olympic action at the Big Hat arena in Nagano Wednesday, Feb. 18, 1998. Associated Press

Dream team has a nightmare

Web posted February 19, 1998

By Dennis Sodomka
Morris News Service

NAGANO -- America's dream team became a nightmare, as the men's hockey team took a mercifully quick exit from the Olympic hockey tournament when they lost to the Czech Republic 4-1.

After sleepwalking through four games, the team of professionals from the National Hockey League were stonewalled by Czech goalie Dominik Hasek and his teammates.

Just a day after the American women provided thrills with their inspired performance to win a gold medal, the men put people to sleep with their sloppy play.

The NHL had billed the Olympic tournament, the first to allow professionals, as the greatest hockey tournament ever, but without the American team, it will lose much of its television appeal in the United States. CBS, which has broadcast rights to these Olympics, and the NHL had hoped for a showdown between Canada and the United States for the gold medal.

"If you don't win the gold it doesn't mean anything,'' said U.S. forward Keith Tkachuk. "It's amazing how things can go so well in one tournament (the World Cup, won by the U.S. last year), and you come back and they go so bad for you.

"If you don't win a gold medal, it's a waste of time. It's disappointing because everybody expected us to be there at the end. We expected to be there at the end. But it didn't turn out that way. It's gonna be a long flight home.''

Asked if it was worth the NHL breaking up the season so its players could join the Olympics, U.S. forward Mike Modano said, "Right now it's not worth it. We're going home with nothing.''

Both teams played a tight first period before Modano scored at 16:12. Tkachuk stole the puck and passed it to Tony Amonte who flipped it to a wide open Madano.

In the second period, Czech turned the game around with two goals in less than minute. The star of the Czech team, Jaromir Jagr assisted on the first goal and scored the second. Seven minutes later the Czechs scored another goal, and it was all over for the United States. The Czechs scored the final goal in the last 40 seconds of the game, after the U.S. had pulled its goalie to get an extra attacker on ice.

Canada remains the favorite for the gold medal, with Russia and Czech also looking strong.