Saturday, February 9, 2002
Slovak airlift set
By BRUCE GARRIOCH -- Ottawa Sun
SALT LAKE CITY -- As Team Slovakia went through its final workout yesterday before the opening of the Olympic men's hockey tournament, only 13 players were on the ice.
But, by the time they face off in the first game of the qualifying round tonight, reinforcements will have arrived.
While Slovakia GM Peter Stastny won't have a full bench against Germany, the team's expected to dress 10 forwards and five defencemen -- leaving room on the roster to add more players.
Even though team officials speculated on Thursday that Senators winger Marian Hossa and defenceman Zdeno Chara might not be needed for tomorrow's game against Latvia, Stastny assured Ottawa GM Marshall Johnston and the Olympic media they would be here.
"This has been a challenge," said Stastny. "But I'm going to follow the rules and give my roster to the (IIHF by midnight last night) and everything is going to be fine.
"We could be short for the game against Austria on Tuesday, but there's not much we can do."
Stastny has been doing a lot of shuffling to get his team ready. At this point, it's difficult just to keep track of who's coming and going.
Los Angeles Kings winger Ziggy Palffy and teammate Lubomir Visnovsky will be here today. Phoenix forward Michal Handzus, Atlanta's Lubos Bartecko and late arrival Miroslav Satan of Buffalo are also expected to play tonight.
Palffy and Visnovsky will also suit up against Latvia. St. Louis winger Pavol Demitra, Boston's Jozef Stumpel, Hossa and Chara will fly in late tonight.
Nashville's Vladimir Orszagh and Peter Smrek (Hartford of AHL) will play all three qualifying games.
"You've got to do what you can with the players that are available. This has been a tough situation because the rules aren't the same for (teams that need to qualify), but the players have been very understanding. They know what it's like," said Stastny.
The Slovaks playing in the qualifying understand they're in a must-win situation. But with 21 bona fide NHL players available should Slovakia advance, certain players who will help them get there are going to be moved out in favour of the big boys.
Slovakian forward Ronald Petrovicky says his teammates will pay that price to help their country move forward.
"I've said this before: We don't think this situation is fair, but there's nothing we can do about it. We aren't going to have all of our best players and we're not going to have a full team, but we have to go on," said the former NHLer, who's playing in Switzerland.
"We just have to take whoever is here and try to win these (qualifying) games so that we have a shot at a medal. That's not going to be easy, but we're going to do everything we can to get something done."
Stastny feels his team will play another day.
"We've got good players here and we feel confident about our chances of advancing," he said. "We'll have players landing at big airports, little airports and some are even driving here. But we're going to have a line-up. That's the best we can do."
2002 Games Men's Hockey Coverage
