Nagano Hockey Hooligans Target of Letter Campaign

Conceding they might never know which members of the U.S. men’s Olympic hockey team vandalized rooms at the Nagano Olympic village in the early hours of Feb. 19, officials of the NHL, U.S. Olympic Committee and USA Hockey will appeal to players’ patriotism and send letters to all 23 players, urging one or more to break the team’s wall of silence.

In a joint statement issued Thursday, the organizations said interviews of players conducted by the NHL’s security department had shed no new light on the incident. Ten chairs were broken, six that were thrown into a garden area from a fifth-floor window. Three fire extinguishers were set off, and one was thrown into the courtyard. Damage also was done to floors, beds and walls. The USOC last week paid 359,000 yen--about $3,000--to the Nagano Organizing Committee, and the NHL has reimbursed the USOC.

The letter to players will include copies of critical correspondence, e-mail and faxes USA Hockey has received about the incident. It’s meant to demonstrate to players the gravity of the incident and show they will all be blamed unless the guilty parties are identified.

“We will appeal to their better judgment and hope they would be a bit more forthcoming,” USA Hockey spokesman Darryl Seibel said. “We are an organization with more than 500,000 members, many of whom are youngsters who look up to these players. It’s a dangerous signal to send to kids. We don’t want those kids to think the misbehavior is in any way acceptable or condoned. . . . Every one of these players has benefited from his participation in the USA Hockey program. Inasmuch as they have an obligation to their teammates, they also have an obligation to this organization.”

Pressure can be applied in other areas, including banning all members of the team from representing the U.S. in the Olympics again and prohibiting them from visiting the White House next month with other U.S. Olympians. Paul George, the U.S. chef de mission at Nagano, said he will consider recommending such teamwide sanctions to the USOC’s executive board unless those responsible are identified.

NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman has said he can punish the culprits under a provision in the NHL constitution that empowers him to sanction conduct detrimental to the game.

“The players responsible apparently don’t get it,” said Mike Moran, assistant executive director of the USOC. “It’s not only disappointing, but frankly astounding to us that no one has the character to admit their role in this. The longer this goes, the more serious it gets.”

Since returning from Nagano, where the disappointing U.S. team was eliminated by the Czech Republic in the playoff quarterfinals, several players have said they knew who the culprits were but refused to identify them. Some players were interviewed by the NHL more than once but no one has been singled out or cleared. Investigators have pieced together some ideas of what might have happened but do not have a clear picture.