By Rob Ficiur

Up until this week I have shied away from making a prediction of who would win the Men’s Hockey Medals at the Vancouver Olympics.  (I predicted the 2006 team would win and they came in seventh).  I didn’t want my bad luck or bias to affect the prediction.
Instead of predicting with my heart; or using a dart board to guess, I turned to the hockey numbers for the last five years.  In these numbers are the answers.  I made a five page list of all the NHL leaders in goals, assists, shutouts, plus / minus and whatever other stat there was.  I added to the list the players who were on the first and second all star teams; players how won the Stanley Cup (and those who lost in the final) and those who won medals at the 2006 Winter Olympics.  With all those stats tallied, I looked at the rosters of the eight main contenders in the 2010 tournament.
On my chart Russia got five points because Evgehni Malkin won the Art Ross Trophy in 2009; Canada got three points because Sidney Crosby was third in league scoring and the USA got one point because Zach Parise was fifth in league scoring.  Sweden got five points for every player on the 2010 roster who helped win the 2006 Gold Medal.   So with the charts in place I began to see who the numbers said would win the Olympic Hockey Medals.  These are the results:
Slovakia 7th place (eight points) -  Though the Slovaks won five games in a row in 2006, their 2010 team has only one NHL star, Zdeno Chara. Though 15 of their 23 players are in the NHL, only Chara has emerged as a league leader.
Czech Republic sixth place (34 points).  The Czechs won the gold medal in 1998 primarily because of the goaltending of Dominec Hasek.  At that time Hasek was the elite goalie in the league.  Six players are returning from the 2006 Czech team that won the Bronze medal. However, most of the points the Czech team earned under my system were earned in 2006 and 2007 by Jarimor Jagr.  Jagr is four years older and no longer an NHL player.
Finland fifth place (64 points).  Many people talk about the 2006 Silver Medal winning Swedes as the team to beat because of their elite goaltending.  However, once we get past Kprasauff and Backstrom the line up consists of second line NHL players such as Oli Jokinen, Jere Lehtinen and the aging Teemu Selane.
United States fourth Place (71 points).  The American team won the Gold Medal at the World Junior Tournament last month, but that does not translate into help for the Olympic team.  The American leaders chose to go with a more youthful team; leaving behind aging veterans like Mike Modano and Chris Chelios (he still plays in the minors).  Patrick Kane, Zach Parise and Bobby Ryan are first line players in the NHL.  Tim Thomas was the leagues’ top goalie last year.  Only five Americans have Olympic experience.  Though they have elite players as forwards and in goal (Ryan Miller could win a medal by himself) their defense is thin.  Two of their seven picks have had to be replaced, so they are entering a two week tournament with their eighth and ninth defensemen.
Sweden third place (183 points) – The Swedes have 14 players returning from the 2006 Gold Medal winning team.  Nicklas Linstrom is playing in his third Olympic Games, which is a way of saying he is getting older.  The Sedin Twins lead a group of top line NHL players.  However, Lindstrom is the only one of their seven defensemen who would be a number one D man on any NHL team.
Russia second place (219 points)  With forwards such as Malkin, Kavalchuk, Ovechkin and Datsyuk, the Russians should be able to score 10 goals in each game.  The problem is if the team doesn’t score 10 goals, their thin defense and average goal tending will make it hard to win it all.  If their goalie gets hot or even lukewarm, the scoring on this team is enough to win the Gold Medal.
Canada first place (297 points).  I was surprised when my scoring system put Canada so far ahead of any other team in the tournament.  However, the team has three #1 goalies. all of whom could win a Gold Medal.  There is a balance of veteran defensemen and new blood – all of whom are the elite D men on their team.  Unlike the USA, if Canada had to call in two new defensemen as replacements, those brought in would be #1 D men from another team.  The Canadian team has 13 forwards who are top line players on their NHL teams.
The numbers don’t lie.  On paper Canada should win the Gold Medal because of the overall depth of the team.  However, in a one game playoff, an elite Russian scorer or an outstanding American Goalie can make all these predictions invalid.
Hold your breath and hang on the next two weeks as we see if Canada can play hockey as good on the ice as they do on the paper.