Another ‘miracle on Ice’

Not since Team USA stunned the Soviet Union at the 1980 Winter Olympics has victory felt this electrifying throughout the West. But last night, the script flipped. Canada played the US role as the scrappy underdog; the US played the Soviet role as the bullying hegemon. That’s how much of a pariah Trump has made America on the world stage — just one month into his second term.

For Canadians, it was a moment of unbridled national pride. For Americans, it was a moment of foreboding national humiliation. For hockey fans, it was an instant classic.

The curse of Trump’s pep talk

Of course, Team USA should have known better than to let Trump into their locker room. His endorsements are a kiss of death — from midterms to corporate bankruptcies, everything he hails fails.

But perhaps Team USA will derive some consolation from Trump helping them lick their wounds by telling them to insist the game was rigged, and to never admit they lost.

Trump made Team USA the new Team USSR

Trump has spent this term goading Canada into becoming the 51st state, making a mafia-style offer to buy Greenland, threatening an invasion to reclaim the Panama Canal, and turning US friends like Ukraine into enemies and US enemies like Russia into friends.

So it’s no wonder his bullying is making America like the old Soviet Union — a reviled superpower, more feared than cheered. That explains the boos echoing through the arena. American fans jeered “O Canada” in Boston, firing back at Canadians who booed “The Star-Spangled Banner” in Montreal.

This wasn’t just a hockey match. It was an ideological and territorial war on ice. And it hinted at something darker — what happens when that fine line (or border) between friendly rivals snaps.

Even so, kudos to Canadian PM Trudeau for giving Trump a taste of his own trolling medicine. He rubbed this victory in Trump’s face with this perfectly petty tweet:

You can’t take our country — and you can’t take our game.

Before Trump, this would have been a simple hockey match between friendly rivals, like the Boston Celtics vs. the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA. But this match felt like war by other means.

Yet nobody watching could mistake the fact that the Canadians were the good guys, the Americans the bad guys. And the good guys won.