Hockey has never been broken as a cultural product south of the Canadian border last week.
ESPN has never dedicated the kind of wall-to-wall coverage to the sport prior to the 4 Nations final, even after becoming an NHL rights holder three seasons ago. PK Subban has become a virus to bashing the NBA. This is during a week's treatment session on the deterioration of the product. Charles Barkley was at TNT wearing a Team USA sweater. President Donald Trump was inserting things by calling Team USA before Thursday's game. In this country, this does not usually happen in this sport.
Team USA coach Mike Sullivan said it was a 3-2 defeat to Canada before Thursday's final. He had heard about this tournament from many people who normally don't call him, and everyone in the media nodded. If you're a hockey fan from your group of friends, you received the same text and phone call last week and made the call.
Now it's the NHL that keeps all these new fans. Now Team USA is winning gold in the Olympics a year later, doing what they couldn't do on Thursday.
