The Best of America, on Ice

By Jeffrey Blehar

Sunday, February 22, 2026

 

I won’t pretend I’ve much been into the Olympics this year — it feels like I followed them intently during my childhood years, but checked out around the age of 18, and I wonder if that’s a natural development for many kids. But there was really no question that I’d be getting up this Sunday morning to watch the Americans compete against the Canadians in a gold medal hockey game. (Sorry, God! See you next week!)

 

Not because I hate the Canadians, mind you — it’s impossible to hate a nation so cuddly and harmless — but because I love the United States. Yes, I am wholly uncomplicated in my sports nationalism: Absent blatant bad sportsmanship, the United States morally deserves to win all contests at all times . . . and if we happen to lose that day, it’s only on the technicality of merit.

 

That’s probably why I have paid little attention to the middling exploits of Olympic skier and medalist Eileen Gu — born in California, attending Stanford University . . . and competing for the Chinese government. Gu has begun publicly complaining about the “vitriol” she is facing for taking advantage of American freedoms, training facilities, and educational opportunities her entire life as an American citizen, and then competing for a brutal and sinister authoritarian regime. But try to understand the world from her point of view: America is just a place to live; meanwhile that so-called “brutal and sinister authoritarian regime” is willing to pay her thereabouts of $5 million per year to sell her talents to the Chinese Communist Party. Come on, Eileen — isn’t the money good enough for you? Or do you miss your soul?

 

No, I’m far more cheered by examples like the remarkable performance of Alysa Liu, daughter of a Chinese refugee who fled to America post–Tiananmen Square. There was zero chance Liu would take China’s money — in fact, China sent spies after Arthur Liu and his daughter; the regime never tires of persecuting its enemies abroad. And though Liu would no doubt blanch to see her gold medal in women’s figure skating held up as a spiritual rebuke to Eileen Gu’s mercenary ways, that is how many people (myself included) regard it nonetheless.

 

Liu seems like quite the odd duck — with her racoon-striped hairstyle, a positively fascinating lip piercing, and youthfully left-coded views — and she’s frankly all the more American for it. I’ve seen fools on social media chiding conservatives for celebrating Liu’s gold medal, with words to the effect of “Don’t you know she’s a progressive? She probably hates your views!” So what? That’s politics. This is about competition and sport. Liu went out there and won gold for America — and looked utterly fabulous doing it in that gold sequined dress. That’s what matters to me.

 

Which brings us to today. It’s a good thing they scheduled the hockey championship game for the final day of the Olympics, because there would have been no point in staging any more events after already hitting peak drama. The U.S. hockey team went out onto the rink in the gold medal matchup against Team Canada and edged out a gutsy, brutally physical 2–1 overtime triumph against their rivals.

 

It was the first Olympic gold for U.S. men’s hockey since the “Miracle on Ice” of 1980, and while the Cold War overtones of Lake Placid’s Olympics can never be equalled, this very much had a “grudge-match” feel to it as well. (Thanks, Trump, I guess.) The U.S. played mostly on the defensive — sometimes brilliantly, like when they faced a 5-on-3 power play after temporarily losing players to penalties. Goalie Connor Hellebuyck spent three periods hunched over the net like Gandalf shouting “YOU SHALL NOT PASS!” at multiple balrog-like Canucks.

 

U.S. forward Jack Hughes had a substantial part of his smile knocked permanently out of his skull by a Canadian player’s high-stick to the face — and he was back on the ice within minutes. A 1–1 tie pushed us into overtime, where the game was finally won by Hughes, gashed-up grill and all, with a perfect shot into the net off an assist. Forty-six years after Lake Placid, the U.S. men’s team had done it again.

 

Watching them celebrate there on the rink made all sorts of authentically powerful emotions well up within me. I might not have cared too much about the Olympics until this point, but seeing the U.S. men’s team leap into one another’s arms (appropriately, to the guitar solo of Skynyrd’s “Free Bird”) made my heart swell in that natural patriotic fashion. Our boys did it.

 

And then my heart broke a little afterwards, when the U.S. players, draped in flags, grabbed departed fellow player Johnny Gaudreau’s jersey and held it aloft while skating silently around the rink. Gaudreau was killed along with his brother while cycling by a drunk driver two years ago, and was guaranteed a spot on the team — the jersey has traveled with them ever since, and Gaudreau’s entire family was in Milan to watch the team. A few moments later out came the two adorable little Gaudreau children — one of whom was born only after he died — as the whole team posed for a picture on the ice.

 

As he was waiting for the medal ceremony, Jack Hughes — down a few teeth but soon to be up one gold medal — immediately handed MVP credit to his goalie Hellebuyck and went on to focus on the only important points: (1) “I love the U.S.A.” (2) “The U.S.A. hockey brotherhood is so strong, and we’re so proud to win for our country.” (Hughes will likely never have to pay for drinks in any Michigan bar for the rest of his life.) On this day, we should return that pride: Our Olympians — their heart, their grit, their endless fight, and their superior achievement — have represented the best of America, once again.