From the Ashes

PICKING UP THE PIECES

It was the worst accident in the collective memories of the hockey world. All 36 team members from Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, an elite team from Russia's top hockey league (KHL), perished on the September 7, 2011 crash. Eight different nations lost sports heroes (including long time Red Wings assistant and former NHL All-Star Brad McCrimmon) in an accident blamed on aging equipment, pilot error an even the presence of banned drugs. Incomprehensible, astonishing, yet all too real for those involved. This was reminiscent of the shocking Marshall football tragedy of 1970, except that so many more nations were affected in the Russian plane crash.

Decisions needed to be made quickly. League president Alexander Medvedev offered to draft 3 players from each team in the league to quickly fill the Lokomotiv roster and get the team up and ready for the regular season, but team president Yuri Yakovlov said no, the community needed time to heal. Not a soul entered the team locker room until the end of October. A decision was then made: maintain the junior team in Lokomotiv, and enter another squad into the minor league just below the KHL, to play an extremely limited schedule of 22 games, once against each opponent. They were allowed a special draft of young players 23 and under throughout the league, two qualified from the Lokomotiv junior league. And in December, a new Lokomotiv team stepped onto theYaroslavl ice in sold out "2000 Arena," and played a hockey game. They won 5-1.

Yakovlov was offered a free pass to get his team into the playoffs, but he declined. The young Yaroslvl skaters have a high enough winning percentage to get into the playoffs on their own merits. Yet he is accepting the millions of dollars in aid from Mother Russia for the victims' families, and on Friday Lokomotiv is playing in an outdoor game exhibition to generate more funds for the loved ones left behind.

Promising stars from Russia's medal-winning junior teams have moved to Yaroslavl to play with Lokomotiv, and will wait an extra year to play in the KHL. Russia's government, it's people, and the entire hockey community have come together to help heal this collective wound. Yuri Yakovlov has chosen a wise course of small steps, to upright this proud franchise.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7Mg1LxjW_0

Hill of Beans

DIGESTI-BILL??

With the finals a foregone conclusion, Boston's annual Beanpot hockey tournament needs some juice. As B.U. coach Jack Parker pointed out, fans are arriving late for game 1 and leaving early in game 2. The BU-BC game, whether it's the championship or a rare first Monday game, is ultimately the Championship game, rendering the other 3 games as anti-climactic. There is one sure-fire way to make this tournament relevant again, but it requires the "R" word...relegation! Can you imagine the jump in interest in the annual Northeastern-Harvard consolation snooze-fest if the two squads were playing for Beanpot survival? Let's explore.

There are two Division I teams close enough to the Hub to make a Monday game downtown a reasonable commute: Merrimack and Mass. Lowell. That's 6 teams, two outsiders play for a chance each year to make the Big 4. Earn the privilege, that's the American way, yes? No entitlements here. Loser of the consolation game--out, but gets to host the play-in game. Likely scenario is that Harvard finds itself on the outside looking in at Merrimack in 2013. How much would that affect the atmosphere of the first Monday of February? Probably a lot more energy in the Garden next year, and the competition would be intense, Five games worth, instead of 1 or 2.

Times are changing. Let's bring some competition into our competitions. Bill Cleary, your thoughts?

Willis redux

ANKLE SPRAIN FROM KRYPTON

NFL fans have seen how a high ankle sprain to Ben Roethlisberger derailed this year's Steeler's Super Bowl dream. Phil Simms said it was the most painful thing he's ever been through, taking him 2 years to get over. Rob Gronkowski has two weeks. The Patriots need their hyper kinetic, 90-catch human highlight film who redefined the tight end position this regular season to be at his cartoon-hero best, just to keep up with the Giants aerial show this Sunday. This has evolved into human drama on a scale appropriate of the Super-setting, maybe even bigger.

It's worthy of any of the Boston - New York sports-zenith clashes, a Superbowl rematch spearheaded by two likely H.O.F. quarterbacks, yet Gronk is the man of the hour, make that man of the fortnight. One cannot overhype his importance to the Patriot's offense this season: 90 catches, 17 TD's over 1300 yards receiving. Yet his stats pale in comparison to HOW he achieved those numbers: helicoptering into endzones, outracing fleet defensive backs, shedding sure tackles punctuated by those signature TD spike explosions. His manic zeal allowed the Boston sports nation forget 4 years of NFL playoff dread. In this age of full-faucet media, on the biggest stage in a sports-mad world, the guy is a supernova beyond comic book proportions. He's GRONK, check the Youtube videos produced out of Boston. That spike of his is the latest craze in the Hub, they call it "Doin the Gronk." The guy is more popular than Brady right now, a rawboned irresistible force with a perpetual smile.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cE_Isf49Pp8

For Sports fans conditioned to instant gratification and a constant flow of live telecasts to slake their thirst for live action (umm, I think that's all of us), these two weeks prior to Supe XLVI have been arduously slow. Yet for Gronk and his recovery, it hasn't been nearly enough. We've heard daily comments from those in the know that the pain will be in full force on Sunday, no amount of enthusiasm and ADHD will mask it. Other than the QB's, he'll be the most important player on the field, and based on his potential impact on the game, a good case could be made that he is the most important player, certainly on the NE side.

And with hundreds (thousands) of side stories being generated in this media blitz from New York and Boston, essentially the entire Northeast United States has a firm rooting interest here, the outcome of this frenzied spectacle boils down to a single player's ability to conquer his personal pain threshold. With him racking up catches, YAC and TD spikes, the Pats will compete; without him they are simply overmatched.

It's been nearly 42 years since Willis Reed blew the roof off the world's most famous arena: shooting up, limping out and swishing two J's before sitting down in a 1-game winner take all for a championship. Stakes are higher now--bigger sport, bigger game, bigger stage, bigger role.

Watch carefully starting at 6 pm ET Sunday for the Willis limp-out. What will Superman do after full exposure to Kryptonite? It could make for a good read by flashlight in a tent in your back yard. Except this is real, live, and in hight def. Consider yourself lucky. Not all baby-boomers reading this can expect to be here in 42 years the next time it happens.