SAN JOSE–San Jose Sharks goaltender Annti Niemi is the quiet one that no one is talking about Niemi of the Finland team. They could be a dark horse to sneak in the back door. Everybody expects or least some of the hockey folks I’ve been talking to expects the U.S. to play Canada in the finals but they also got to look out for Russia.

Russia has a strong team and they have the home ice advantage, probably the most interesting thing so far in the Olympics is the women’s U.S. hockey team and it’s kind of hard to follow because they play in the middle of the night for us on the west coast. Apparently they had 9-0 a trouncing last Sunday night for a big win and they did really well with the U.S. who had three goals in 55 seconds.

The Sharks Patrick Marleau and Marc-Edouard Vlasic whose representing Canada and then you have Captain America Joe Pavelski who is not the captain of the U.S. team but who got the nickname because of his clutch play in the last two months. For Marleau he’s been to multiple Olympiads but for Vlasic this is his first time and listening to a radio interview he had earlier he was saying how he was looking forward to bringing the gold home period.

Intresting pieces of the puzzle some of the players now that are going to be Vlasic’s teammates in the NHL who he plays against but he put that all aside for a couple of weeks and is playing for the team for your country. I don’t know how that would work for me if I were on team USA knowing that Dustin Brown from the L.A. Kings took out the Sharks Tomas Hertl in a regular season game was my co-captain from my Olympic team.

I might be tempted during practice to give him a little extra rub on the boards, but this is about playing for your country. It’s a special time for everybody.

As far as the safety is concerned I know that Marleau left his kids at home to a nice twitter feed of and his kids who gave him a nice hug goodbye not wanting him to leave. The great mix of players who have been on the Olympic team and a few new faces will just add to the attraction from having a great team together it’s all about chemestry.

They all have their own ways of playing and it’s how they blend those ways together in the two weeks they have together they have about three practices before they get ready for the real deal, they have to put away the jet lag, time differences, some players were living on the west coast some players from the east coast have to fly half way around the world to Russia.

They have to get aquainted with their new hotel or bed surrounding because there’s been nothing but craziness as far as the accomendations are going down there in Sochi. It will be interesting to see how they battle all those little mynute little ingredients that will be taking a toll on their body and their mind before they actually start playing the game.

Larry Leavitt does commentary on the NHL each week for Sportstalk radio