After months and months of nothing but speculation and waiting, the day has finally arrived – the 2014 Olympic Men’s Hockey Tournament starts tomorrow night in Sochi. The best players from around the world, including four members and a coach from the Buffalo Sabres, will compete over international bragging rights for the next four years.
However, before the puck officially drops tomorrow, there’s still plenty to talk about, news to share, and predictions to make. So let’s start with the important stuff:
Tomorrow’s schedule
Czech Republic vs. Sweden*
12:00pm – USA Network
*Sabres players involved: Henrik Tallinder, Jhonas Enroth
Latvia* vs. Switzerland
12:00pm – MSNBC
*Sabres players involved – Zemgus Girgensons
Note: All game times listed are EST. For those who want to do the math, Sochi is 9 hours ahead of Buffalo.
How can I watch?
If you can’t get to a TV to watch (the channels and broadcast times are listed above) then you can stream the games from NBC’s Olympic website or through their NBC Live Extra app.
How can I follow all the games/news/’MURICA?
We’ll be posting daily Olympic recaps each night with the following day’s schedule and viewing info, and will also be posting open threads each morning that we can all hang out in and use as game threads for that day’s hockey/curling events. Make sure to bookmark our Sochi 2014 hub page, which will be updated with all the news, notes, and results from the land of nine time zones. We’ll be covering all the hockey games, but will be focusing on the Sabres players and coaches at the tournament.
If you’re looking for more casual, patriotic ways to keep up with the Olympics, try following @USAbesthockey on Twitter (a hyper-jingoistic USA Hockey account) or checking in every so often with SBN’s Flawless Olympics hub, which is collecting all the incredible ways that Sochi is both failing and winning the Olympics at the same.
Prediction time!
OK, smarty-pants, let’s see what you’ve got. Let us know in the comments which countries you think will walk away with gold, silver, and bronze, and win the undying admiration of a small chunk of the internet.
