U.S. Hockey Is a Late Arrival

Only two members of the U.S. men’s Olympic hockey team arrived in Turin in time for a news conference Monday at the athletes’ village.

One, though, was goaltender John Grahame, ensuring that the U.S. won’t have to play with an empty net.

Travel problems and a schedule that had 14 NHL teams playing on Sunday left Grahame and Calgary Flame defenseman Jordan Leopold with not much to do on their first day at the Games. Jim Johannson, the U.S. team leader, joked that he’d run into officials from the Czech and Swedish federations who were waiting for players with open arms and were as anxious as he was.

“We’re at the mercy of the system,” he said. “But a lot of players have played for us at the world championships and are used to this.”

Some players who had planned to arrive Monday were stranded in Ottawa because of bad weather, then missed a connection in Philadelphia. Johannson said the rest of the team and Coach Peter Laviolette were due to arrive today. The U.S. team’s only practice is scheduled for tonight at the Esposizioni, the secondary competition arena. The U.S. will open against Latvia on Wednesday.

“We would have liked one more day” to practice, Johannson said. “But we appreciate the long break the NHL is taking. Every country, the USA included, wanted the best players here. Some of that’s obviously out of our control.”

The brevity of the break before the Olympic opener would be discussed before plans are made for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games, he said.

Asked whether any members of the U.S. team were ensnared in a scandal that became public last week -- when authorities charged Phoenix Coyote assistant coach Rick Tocchet with operating a sports gambling ring that allegedly took bets from Janet Jones, wife of Team Canada Executive Director Wayne Gretzky -- Johansson said no one at USA Hockey had been informed of the involvement of any Olympians.

“We have no knowledge of that,” he said.

Leopold could hardly avoid hearing about it in hockey-mad Canada. He said, however, that he didn’t expect that it would overshadow the tournament.

“You’re trying to prepare for the Olympics and your NHL games. It’s a lot of background noise,” he said. The gambling ring could be “a one-hit wonder,” Leopold added. “A lot of those stories have a big day and disappear. The big story here is that the best players in the world are here. For me, this is a dream come true.”

Grahame and Leopold said they’d had relatively smooth trips to Turin, though both said they’d gotten little sleep on their flights. Not seeing other teammates when they arrived in Turin “was a little bit strange,” said Grahame, a Denver native whose father, Ron, played for the Kings.

“You want to get things going,” he said. “With only two of us here, me and Jordan will get to know each other pretty good.”

They did play against each other in the 2004 Stanley Cup finals, in which Grahame’s Tampa Bay Lightning defeated Leopold’s Flames. They say they’ll have no problem playing together.

“It comes down to mutual respect for everybody,” said Leopold, a native of Golden Valley, Minn. “By tomorrow, we’ll probably be best friends.”