Vancouver 2010 Olympic Mens Hockey : Last Games of the Seeding Round 88
![Ice Hockey - Day 9 -Russia v Slovakia](http://cdn.picapp.com/ftp/Images/c/e/6/4/Ice_Hockey_4176.jpg?adImageId=10577683&imageId=8033494)
The top six teams in the men’s Olympic hockey tournament play each other today in the final game of the seeding round. The winners today and the loser with the best record will grab the four tournament byes into the quarterfinals. Win the quarter final game and you’re guaranteed to play for a medal.
The match-ups feature the countries that met in the last three olympic gold medal games. Group A features the USA versus Canada game a reprise of Salt Lake City. The Czech versus Russian gold medal game from Nagano is also the final match-up in group B. Group C is a game between Turin’s gold and silver medalists Sweden and Finland.
The point system for this olympics has a bureaucratic complexity that makes one fear the NHL will be adopting it for their regular season immediately.
The Russians have lost a shoot-out game to the Slovaks already. A loss to the Czechs will drop them behind Slovakia to be seventh seed in the tournament. Canada with their overtime win over Switzerland garnering them only two points will not get a bye without a victory over the Americans.
Hopefully it won’t come down to goal differentials to determine final seeding. Then the complexities will grade into byzantine ones. Read the rest of this entry →