American Firsts and High-Flying Stunts: Sochi Day 12

     Coming into Monday's action in Sochi, there were several things that Team USA had never done in an Olympics in a while, such as medal in the 2-man Bobsled, or take the Gold in Ice Dancing.  By the end of the day, both of those accomplishments would be notched as completed.

     But first, lets go to Rosa Khutor and watch some more freestyle skiing.  Monday was the day of the Men's Aerials heats.  How Aerials works is pretty much the same as Slopestyle, except that there's only 1 jump.  In 2010, Belarus won the Gold in Men's Aerials, and up till now no country has ever repeated Gold.  Until this year, when Anton Kushnir walked up and turned in a record-breaking performance that captured Gold for Belarus for the second consecutive Olympics.

     Leaving Rosa Khutor for the Sanki Sliding Center, time for the Bobsled heats.  Entering the heats, Team USA hadn't medaled in 2-Man Bobsled since 1952.  Steve Holcomb and his team were out to change that, and change that they did.  Their performance was good enough for Bronze, and a 62-year drought was broken.  And the Americans weren't the only ones breaking droughts either.  The Russians had never won Gold in the 2-man event, but they were going to change that.  And through the efforts of Alexander Zubhov, they were able to change that.

     After all of that drama, it's finally time to head over to the Iceberg.  The big story here is that the United States had never won an Ice Dancing Gold.  With Meryl Davis and Charlie White, our odds improved, but we still had the 2010 winners Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir to contend with.  However, after the skates, Team USA managed to pull through and take the first ever Ice Dancing Gold for the USA.  Just one more reason why these Sochi Games are shaping up to be so historic.

Costas Watch: Day 7-HE'S BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!

     Okay guys, I'm over the moon ecstatic right now, all because of one thing.  BOB COSTAS CAME BACK TONIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!  Somebody play the Hallelujah Chorus!

     That's right folks, AMERICA HAS BEEN SAVED!!!!!!!!  We made it through the struggles, and we came out on the other side better people for it.  No more Matt Lauer, more Meredith Vieira, and thankfully NBC didn't have to hand the ball over to Al Roker.  Now that that distraction is out of the way, we can get back to our normal business of cheering on Team USA over the final 6 days of the Games.

Costas Watch: Day 6

     Well, we turned on the Olympics last night and what did we see?  Not Meredith Vieira, but no Bob Costas either.  Instead, it appears that NBC has gone back to Matt Lauer this time, because Bob Costas is still out.  At this point, I'm tempted to hand the commentary over to Oprah:

     Will he ever return?  Will our great nation ever be restored to its former glory?  Will The Olympics ever be the same again?  Stay tuned to find out.


     LATE BREAKING UPDATE:  According to MSN, Bob Costas is supposed to be coming back for tonight's coverage.  Now I'm not sure if I want to bet the farm on it yet, but this is clearly the best sign we've gotten in a while.  So I'll be watching VERY closely along with the rest of you, and hopefully I will have glorious news to report to you after tonight's coverage.

Nice Hat, Bro.

     Any of you who were watching the figure skating competition and saw the Pairs heat, probably saw the American pairing of Marissa Castelli and Simon Shnapir.  They took Bronze in the Team competition and finished 9th in the Pairs heat.  But lets focus on Shnapir for a second.  He was born in Russia and came to America as a child.  His parents were cheering him on in the stands, and his father was a sight to behold:

     Yeah.  That hat.  Just look at it, and if you don't feel more American just for that, we might need to check your pulse.  So keep watching Figure Skating, and keep feeling more American!

Age is Served, the 2014 "Miracle", Three Thousandths of a Second, and Ahn Return to Glory: Sochi Day 10

     Albertville. Lillehammer. Nagano. Salt Lake City. Turin. Vancouver. Sochi.  What do those cities have in common?  Aside from them being the hosts for the Winter Games dating back to 1992, They are also all Games which have featured Noriaki Kasai in ski-jumping.  That's right, the man who turned 41 years old back in June is still competing in the Games this year.  There are Olympians who weren't even born yet when Kasai started competing(including Team USA's dancing Luger Kate Hansen), which makes his age and the fact that he's still competing(and not suffering Plushenko-style breakdowns)really impressive.  And not only did he still compete, he competed well, taking the Silver Medal, which was his first Individual medal(he won Silver as part of a Team in 1994).

     Moving over to the Bolshoy Ice Dome, we've got some Hockey to talk about.  Now it wasn't for the Gold Medal, but when you put USA and Russia up against each other, it's always going to be a hot ticket.  And today was no exception.  The two teams battled to a 2-2 tie at the end of Regulation, though that was only preserved by virtue of a Russian goal being waved off at the end of the period.  So, it was on to overtime.  After the scoreless overtime period, they moved to shootouts. At that point, T.J. Oshie skated out and finally scored the game-winning goal, moving Team USA to victory.  Now it was only a match in Group play, so it wasn't as important as 1980 was, but there was one familiar face there.  Al Michaels was calling the game on NBC.  Yup, that Al Michaels.

     Speaking of improbable and frankly insane finishes, let's go back to the Adler Arena for more Speed Skating.  The Men's 1500 Meter race was contested, and this was the next big shot for Shani Davis to repeat as an Olympic Champion.  Much had been made about the uniforms used by Team USA and their supposed inequities, and they received special dispensation to replace them with a better model.  Alas, that did not seem to work, as both Davis and Brian Hansen finished off of the podium, in 11th and 7th place respectively.  But that wasn't the most gripping tale to come out of the 1500 Meter.  No, that comes to us courtesy of the uber-photo finish between Zbigniew Bródka and Koen Verweij.  The two skaters finished so closely that it was initially called a tie, until the timing was reviewed and Bródka was declared the winner by three one-thousandths of a second.

     The sport of Speed Skating wasn't done giving us Olympic moments though, and for that we head to the Iceberg for the Short Track heats.  Victor Ahn was in the midst of trying to reclaim the Olympic glory that had eluded him, and had already captured a Bronze medal, when the 1000 Meter came up.  After a well-fought battle, Ahn finally had Olympic Gold.  So regardless of how old you may think you are, the Olympic dream is never totally out of reach.  Just ask Victor Ahn and Noriaki Kasai.

Costas Watch: Day 5

     We've had to make it through a fifth day now without Bob Costas welcoming us to the Fortress of SolitudeInternational Broadcast Center.  Luckily, the greatest medical professionals of our time have finally come to a completely scientific reason for Costas' absence:

     That's a really good thing, because as we all know, it is necessary to know the cause of something before we try to treat it.  However, just because we know how to fix something, doesn't mean there's any hope of fixing it.  WE ARE FACING A DISASTER HERE, PEOPLE!  Get worried, get panicked!  Because without Costas around to guide us through the Olympic Games, I am deeply afraid that the State of our Union going forward could be depicted in this picture:

     While NBC has so far fielded a good spread of fill-ins, Bob better get back quick if we ever want this great nation to be the America of our forefathers again.

The Olympic Spirit, An Unexpected Milestone, and A Long Awaited Olympic Moment: Sochi Day 9

     When Americans turned on their televisions to see NBC's primetime coverage last night, they were greeted not by the visage of Bob Costas(who is still out with an eye infection), and not by the visage of Matt Lauer, but instead by the warm face of Meredith Vieira, who was pulled from the ranks of the Today Show.  While that certainly makes the hosting gig seem like a revolving door, this is important for another reason.  Meredith Vieira is actually the first woman to ever be the lead anchor of a network's Olympic coverage.

     So with that bit of history, lets get to the Olympics, shall we?  Before we talk about the actual competitions, I just wanted to mention something that happened today in the Skiathlon heats.  The Men's 15 km race was won by Dario Cologna from Switzerland.   After he won his competition, he stuck around to congratulate the other competitors.  And not just the other guys who finished behind him.  No, Cologna waited until the VERY LAST skier crossed the line, and then congratulated him.  That skier was Roberto Carcelen, one of only 3 athletes in Sochi from Peru.  If there is any better way to exhibit the Olympic Spirit, I haven't seen it.

     And now, back to Rosa Khutor.  This was the time for Men's Supercombined, a sport where two Americans(Bode Miller and Ted Ligety) were poised to do great things.  However, as has been the trend this Games with  Americans seemingly on the edge of greatness(Shaun White, Shani Davis, etc...) it was not to be.  Miller wound up finishing 6th, and Ligety slid into 12th Place.

     Moving over to the Iceberg for what wound up being a much less dramatic day than yesterday, the skaters competed in the Men's Free Skate.  Since Evgeni Plushenko had retired the day before, there was no Russian representative in the Finals.  After his fall yesterday, Jeremy Abbott was all but out of medal contention, but qualified for the Free Skate, and so he skated the program anyway.  With the announcement that he was retiring after the current season, this amounted to Abbott's farewell tour.  After all of that, we were left with Yuzuru Hanyu, putting the icing on the cake from his Short Program.  Hanyu went into the Free Skate, and actually fell down, but got right back up, and in fact did well enough to secure himself the Gold Medal, which is the first one ever awarded to Japan in the Men's Figure Skating category.

     But the truly momentous story comes to us from the Sanki Sliding Center, in the finals of the Women's Skeleton.  Yesterday we talked a little bit about Noelle Pikus-Pace and her long wait for her Olympic Moment.  After training for the 2006 Games, she was forced out by a freak injury.  After coming back for Vancouver, she finished in 4th Place, after which she retired.  She eventually got back into Skeleton at the urging of her husband, so that she could finally realize her dream.  She made it to Sochi, and then last night took Silver in the Skeleton Finals, finally realizing her dreams of winning an Olympic Medal, showing that even a dream deferred for 8 years can still be realized.