THE CROWD

Arriving at the E Center in the morning, there was a real electricity outside the arena - due to the small but vocal contingent of Russian hockey fans. They were shouting "RU-SI-AY! RU-SI-AY!", singing, waving Russian flags, painting their faces, cheering with other Russian fans that they met in the parking lot.

I'd seen this stuff on tv - but it was something else to see it in person. Awfully cool.

On the way into the arena, some.... let's call them pseudo-intellectuals, were discussing how interesting it was to see Belarus play against Russia. "They used to be like one country. And they used to be best friends, but now they're like enemies." Wow - what a description.

Leaving the slack-jawed geography/history-challenged yokels behind, we entered the arena and found our seats. Then the Russian team came out for warm-ups... and the hockey fan in me just geeked out. Fedorov, Bure, Yashin, Kovalev, Kovalchuk, Larionov, Samsonov, Zhamnov, Afinogenov, Gonchar, Kasparaitis, and on and on and on. The amount of hockey talent on that one side was absolutely unreal.

Before I knew it, the puck had dropped and the game had started. The game started at 11am local time, so the crowd wasn't as lively as it could have been. Still, there was a lot of buzz from the vocal Russian fans.

Two things irritated me immediately. One - the best seats in the house were empty. Seats at center ice behind the two benches were apparently all corporate gifts to Olympics sponsors because they were empty. Meanwhile, up in the cheap seats where I was, we had a loud crowd of Russian fans and hockey fans gasping at every pass, every shot, every save. It just sucks that the best seats aren't for the best fans, but for corporate suits who don't even show up.

[Side story: A friend of mine did something about the empty seats - he snuck down and took them. He ended up seated behind Russian hockey legend Vladislav Tretiak.]

Second irritating thing about this game - some woman in a Mighty Ducks jersey sitting in our section. So she's a Ducks fan - no big deal... except that any time the announcer announced Oleg Tverdovsky or Ruslan Salei's name, she broke out her STUPID DUCK CALL. In the spirit of Olympic unity, everyone wanted to strangle this woman.

Nothing brings people together than a common irritant.

THE GAME

Russia jumped out to a quick 1-0 lead. Red Wing Sergei Fedorov centered a line with Bruin Sergei Samsonov on one side and Thrasher Ilya Kovalchuk on the other. Kovalchuk was particularly impressive - this was the first time I'd seen him play in person and the comparisons to Mario were not exaggerations. This guy was huge, strong, and very fast out there on the ice.

Facing this dominant Russian was the scrappy Belarus team, which was a surprise to even make it past the Preliminary tournament. Even falling behind 1-0 and 4-1, the Belarus team continued to scrap away and keep the game close.

Superstar Russian goaltender Nikolai Khabibulin played poorly and let in goals that he should've stopped. But Russia was just too strong and won 6-4.

During the post game handshake, some of the Belarus players were seen razzing Khabibulin about his play. Khabibulin trained with some of the Belarus players during the off-season.

• NHL.com Recap

After the game was over, a bunch of us walked to grab lunch in the nearby area where we wandered past Gary Thorne of ESPN. Meanwhile, a few of my friends ran into Gary Bettman (supposedly a very friendly guy). After lunch, we headed back to the E Center for the next big game.

                        1ST  2ND  3RD     TOTAL
                        ---  ---  ---     -----
    RUSSIA               3    1    2        6
    BELARUS              1    2    1        4  FINAL

    GOAL SCORING:

      1ST PRD: RUS - SERGEI SAMSONOV 1 (ILYA KOVALCHUK, SERGEI FEDOROV)
                     1:45
               BLR - OLEG ANTONENKO 1 (VASSILI PANKOV) 8:20
               RUS - (PP) ALEXEI ZHAMNOV 1 (PAVEL BURE) 17:32
               RUS - ILYA KOVALCHUK 1 (UNASSISTED) 19:39
      Penalties-
               A. Makritsky, Belarus (cross-checking), 14:13; 
               A. Andrievsky, Belarus (slashing), 17:23. 
               
      2ND PRD: RUS - ALEXEI YASHIN 1 (UNASSISTED) 5:16
               BLR - (PP) OLEG KHMYL 1 (UNASSISTED) 6:42
               BLR - (PP) ALEXEI KALYUZHNY 1 (UNASSISTED) 14:01
      Penalties-
               I. Kovalchuk, Russia (roughing), 5:39; 
               S. Fedorov, Russia (high-sticking), 13:09; 
               A. Makritsky, Belarus (hooking), 18:20; 
               S. Stas, Belarus (roughing), 18:48; 
               P. Bure, Russia (roughing), 18:48. 
               
      3RD PRD: RUS - BORIS MIRONOV 1 (MAXIM AFINOGENOV) 2:21
               RUS - SERGEI FEDOROV 1 (MAXIM AFINOGENOV) 4:04
               BLR - (PP) RUSLAN SALEI 1 (VLADIMIR TSYPLAKOV, OLEG KHMYL)
                     18:23
      Penalties-
               A. Makritsky, Belarus (high-sticking), 10:18; 
               D. Kasparaitis, Russia (interference), 16:52. 

   POWER-PLAY CONVERSIONS: RUS - 1 OF 4, BLR - 3 OF 3.

   SHOTS ON GOAL:       1ST  2ND  3RD     TOTAL
                        ---  ---  ---     -----
                  RUS   17    8   11       36
                  BLR    6   18    9       33

         GOALIES: RUS - NIKOLAI KHABIBULIN
                  BLR - SERGEI SHABANOV, ANDREI MEZIN(2ND)

       OFFICIALS: REF - Stephen Walkom
                  LIN - Michael Cvik, Johan Norrman

             ATT: 8,484