A Golden Games ... Or Game?

No doubt, you've long ago heard about Canada's master plan to top the medals table at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics.
Own The Podium, the program is called, and that dream finish is also front and centre in the CTV/Rogers Olympic Broadcast Consortium's series of 'Do You Believe?' commercials that are becoming more and more prevalent on the likes of CTV, TSN and Rogers Sportsnet, to name a few (you'd have to be living under a rock to have not seen it by now).
Those of us who follow amateur sport with some regularity don't believe the thought is overly audacious. Even the U.S.-based Associated Press is picking us to win 29 medals (including 15 golds) in Vancouver — the same total that put Germany on top of the medal count at Torino 2006.
But Sports Illustrated's Michael Farber brought up a rather interesting (and, it says here, valid) point about owning the podium earlier today on TSN's The Sports Reporters with Dave Hodge. He related a conversation he had a few months back with Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who expressed concern that many Canadians' view of the success (or failure) of the Vancouver Games will be largely based on the result of the gold-medal game in men's hockey.
Sound a little far-fetched? Guess again.
I've thought for the longest time that if Canada won only two medals in Vancouver — gold in men's and women's hockey — a vast number of people in this country would consider these Games a raging success. By extension, it would also mean that 29 medals won't mean a hoot to plenty of folks if it doesn't include men's hockey gold.
Yes, I'm dead serious.
All of which means that there are lots of people in our country who need an epic reality check. Yes, we're a hockey-mad nation that is outrageously protective of 'our game' and the belief that we should win gold in every major hockey tournament at any level.
But long before the the men's hockey gold-medal game is played Feb. 28, I hope to be cheering on a whole bunch of Canadians to medal-winning performances in a wide array of sports. That's the magic of the Olympics and why it's the planet's greatest five-ring sporting circus.
Turning all these other wonderful sports and athletes (many of which only get noticed once every four years) into a mere side show for a hockey tournament misses that point — not to mention what has the potential to be Canada's finest hour on the Olympic stage.
Let's not let one hockey result (good or bad) lessen any of that.
*****
This deserved mention on Friday, but good on the Canadian Olympic Committee for its selection of speed skater Clara Hughes as our flagbearer for the opening ceremony on Feb. 12 at B.C. Place. By all accounts, this is a young woman that embodies everything about the Olympic spirit, both on the playing field (ice?) and off it.
Ask me about my favourite Torino 2006 memories and I can still vividly recall Hughes' dramatic dash to gold in the women's 5,000 metres event — an effort that left the Winnipeg native sobbing with joy and exhaustion afterward.
Still gives me the chills even thinking about it four years later.