EDITORIAL – Sure, the Oilers lost, but it’s not exactly a national crisis

An editorial by Mel Rothenburger.

I WENT TO SLEEP last night feeling disappointed. I woke up this morning feeling somewhat depressed.

As the day got underway, that was replaced with introspection over the events of the last few weeks.

The Oilers lost. It seems like a big deal, but is it? I’m not a hockey fan, but I’m a hockey playoff fan. I disliked the Oilers when they were playing the Canucks, but once they were the only Canadian-based team left in the running for the Stanley Cup, I cheered for them. Watched every game of the finals against the Florida Panthers.

It seemed ridiculous to me that Florida has an NHL team, let alone a good one. It seemed even more ridiculous that it’s been so many years since a Canadian team has brought home the Cup. Whatever happened to the good old days when we could depend on the Montreal Canadians or Toronto Maple Leafs to get the job done? When the NHL was truly Canadian, when Hockey Night in Canada was just that.

Foster Hewett calling the shots. “He shoots, he scores!” he’d scream. Or gleefully describe pushing and shoving on the ice as “a real donnybrook.”

Hockey was everything to this country. And for a few weeks this spring, it brought the country together again. But it’s just a game. A big money game, to be sure. The final wasn’t between a Canadian team and an American team. There are more Canadians on the Florida team than there are Americans. Their coach is a Canadian.

The Oilers roster is mostly Canadian with a couple of Americans and Europeans thrown in. But they’re all professional athletes paid to entertain us. Next season a lot of them might be playing somewhere else because that’s the business end of it; they go where they’re told to go or where they can make the best deal.

The real sense of country comes in the major international tournaments when teams are created according to nationality. When our Canadian team steps on the ice wearing the red Maple Leaf on their jerseys, that’s when the heart really swells with pride at being a Canadian.

So, while it was fun and exciting to cheer for a “Canadian” team in its quest to “bring Lord Stanley’s cup home,” I won’t be disappointed for long.

There will always be another playoff or tournament to look forward to.

Mel Rothenburger is a former regular contributor to CFJC-TV and CBC radio, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor.  He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.