U.S Men’s Team Adds Some Insult to the Early Exit

Some U.S. hockey players trashed their rooms at the Olympic Village after being knocked out of the Nagano Games, and the NHL was investigating who was responsible for the damage, estimated at $1,000.

Chairs were broken, two apartments were damaged by fire extinguishers, and one extinguisher was thrown from the fifth floor into a common area in the incident, which occurred about 4 a.m. Thursday, said Paul George, head of the U.S. delegation in the Olympic Village.

Members of the U.S. Olympic Committee discovered the damage about three hours later, and NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and players’ union chief Bob Goodenow, along with other U.S. hockey officials, went to the site to investigate.

“The USOC and our Olympic delegation are deeply disturbed by the behavior of some of our athletes,” said USOC president Bill Hybl.

USA Hockey said “a few members” of the team were involved in the incident.

“There was a mess,” International Ice Hockey Federation president Rene Fasel said. “I had information from the U.S. side something happened after the game.”

“We believe only a handful of individuals were involved,” David Ogrean, USA Hockey executive director, said Friday.

“This is an unfortunate incident and one that we deeply regret,” Ogrean said. “We apologize to the American delegation and the other members of the 1998 U.S. Olympic Winter Games team for this regrettable situation.

“Obviously such conduct is unacceptable and will not be tolerated,” Bettman said.

Both USA Hockey and the NHL have offered to pay the costs of the damage to the rooms.

Considered at least a silver-medal contender going into the Olympics--the first to feature NHL players--the Americans instead lost 4-1 in the quarterfinals to the Czech Republic on Wednesday.

The U.S. Olympic Committee reported that “American athletes damaged village property,” according to Mitsuru Katsuoka, media director for the village.

“We received information from the USOC that some athletes did damage to some rooms,” Katsuoka said. He said he hadn’t inspected the rooms, didn’t know how many were damaged or to what extent and didn’t know which athletes might have been involved.

Ogrean said the investigation was complicated by the fact that the U.S. players left for home Thursday.