1978-1980 USSR Hockey Teams vs Best Canadian teams

[ChimpGrip]

As someone who studies Russian, I have always found the old Soviet hockey teams interesting and fun to read about. I've even got a Igor Larionov jersey in my sports jerseys collection. 

For those who know the sport better than I do, how would the best Soviet hockey teams do against the best Olympic Canadian teams of all time? 

For what its worth, the USSR beat an NHL all-star team 6-1 in either 1979 or 1980

[maxchoboian]

The USSR team was made up of Russian allstars, who were very good, and had the advantage of playing together year round. They would have been favored against just about any Olympic team, because the other Olympic teams did not have nearly as much time together. All things being equal, such as a group of Canada's best spending a year with one another on the ice, 6-1 losses to the USSR would have been few and far between. There would be some losses, and some wins, but 6-1 Red Army wins would not be the norm.

[Troll]

9 hours ago, maxchoboian said:

The USSR team was made up of Russian allstars, who were very good, and had the advantage of playing together year round. They would have been favored against just about any Olympic team, because the other Olympic teams did not have nearly as much time together. All things being equal, such as a group of Canada's best spending a year with one another on the ice, 6-1 losses to the USSR would have been few and far between. There would be some losses, and some wins, but 6-1 Red Army wins would not be the norm.

Russians were an "allstar team", while the others were just "teams of allstars"...

 

PS: Until one day.....the USA 😁

[I AM IRONMAN]

Do you believe in miracles??

[Blueliner]

14 hours ago, ChimpGrip said:

As someone who studies Russian, I have always found the old Soviet hockey teams interesting and fun to read about. I've even got a Igor Larionov jersey in my sports jerseys collection. 

For those who know the sport better than I do, how would the best Soviet hockey teams do against the best Olympic Canadian teams of all time? 

For what its worth, the USSR beat an NHL all-star team 6-1 in either 1979 or 1980

The 1977-1984  Soviet Red Army Hockey Team was the greatest hockey club ever in my opinion: Tretziak,(G), Maltziev, Makhailov, Kharmalov, Fetisov, Petrov, Larionov, Makarov, and a bunch of other "ovs" were a team that no other nation could match. Not even close actually. These guys were studs and could've all play in the NHL easily. Many of them did later in their careers once they were allowed to. During that time span they only lost 4 times (once was the miracle) and tied 7. During that time they won every Olympic, World Championship, and all other international tourneys in which they participated (minus the miracle). They beat the NHL-All Stars 6-1 and 6-0 in two games in '79. That All-Star team had 20 future HOFers on it. 20!

There were several reasons as to why they were so good. (1) As max already stated, these guys were professionals from about 15 years of age as their "job" in the military was to play hockey. So they weren't being paid to play hockey, per se, they were being paid to be soldiers. That's how they got around the whole amateur status thing when all other nations had to send true amateurs to competitions. (2) Their director of hockey operation implemented a cutting edge, new style of hockey that emphasized skating, puck control, and passing the puck to open spaces (rather than to specific players) with teammates anticipating where the puck is going to be. The rest of the world was still playing physical, 2-3 passes and crash the net. It was no match. Even after everyone figured out what they were doing they still couldn't stop it. And (3)...and most important....they simply practiced literally twice to three times more than any other team. They were effing good!

How would they stack up to Canada's best teams? Man, you can go down the list of Canada's best teams over the past couple of decades and just be floored by some of the names. The US has had some pretty damn good teams too as well as Sweden and "Russia". I am of the opinion that today's hockey players are sooooo much faster now than they were back then. The stick handling of today's players is ridiculous. And the biggest difference now is conditioning. Conditioning is off the charts better. That said, I think that all through the 80s, 90', and into the 2000s even (2010 or so), that Soviet team would still hold it's own because the NHL still played a slower, physical game that they could exploit.

However, NOW, the league has gotten away from all of the clutching, grabbing, obstructing, and fighting and we're now seeing these elite skaters making plays during games that you'd only try in practice in the past. Some of these kids are astronomically good because of that. I'd say that today's Canada's best (with a little practice) would be a helluva 7- games series against the Reds with Canada prevailing. Like I said, the Soviets were already playing this way back in the day. But their conditioning wouldn't be able to match the kids today. After all, (other than some fluky shit and bad coaching) it was the USA's conditioning that did in the Soviets in '80. Bring it on!!!

edit: And obviously Jim Craig standing on his head for 60 minutes had a little something to do with the USA beating them. 

[Blueliner]

Jeez...I miss playing. I've played my entire life. I was playing midgets when the US beat the Soviets. We were all going apeshit talking about how the US was the best. LOL! That US team couldn't beat that Soviet team again in a 100 tries after that win. But we were the best THAT day.

This coronavirus (cough-dems) have really screwed this up for an "old" guy like me, as it will definitely be hard to get back up to that kind of conditioning now that I've lost it by not seeing a rink for over two months. I can do stick drills and shooting in the garage, but there is nothing that I can do to simulate hockey conditioning. Maybe THAT is why I'm so salty🤣

[Rippers]

12 hours ago, Blueliner said:

The 1977-1984  Soviet Red Army Hockey Team was the greatest hockey club ever in my opinion: Tretziak,(G), Maltziev, Makhailov, Kharmalov, Fetisov, Petrov, Larionov, Makarov, and a bunch of other "ovs" were a team that no other nation could match. Not even close actually.

It was a couple of years later, but the Red Army team once fielded a line of Sergei Federov, Pavel Bure and Alexander Molginy.  That would have been pretty tough to beat.

[Blueliner]

3 minutes ago, Rippers said:

It was a couple of years later, but the Red Army team once fielded a line of Sergei Federov, Pavel Bure and Alexander Molginy.  That would have been pretty tough to beat.

Hell yeah! No doubt. The next gen Red Army team featured those guys on the SAME line. My mind just melts just trying to imagine what that must have looked like playing against non-NHL caliber players. Bure is the fastest skater that I've ever seen. That dude was stupid-sick-fast until injury sadly cut his career short. Mogilny and Fed were just phenomenal hockey players obviously. There is certainly a reason as to why pretty much every NHL organization was drooling to get these guys. That being said, the earlier Reds were simply loaded top to bottom and they had the best goalie in the world. I think the later Russia teams were awesome, but THAT mojo (and mystique) that made them great had kinda left the team in the mid 80s in my humble opinion. 

[Bormio]

All of this makes the “Miracle  on Ice” a true miracle.  Funny thing, I remember thinking we had a shot before that game, because of the way we tied the Swedes in the last half minute and handled the Czechs.  We were on a roll.  But I was nuts, we should have had no shot. 

[Blueliner]

3 hours ago, Bormio said:

All of this makes the “Miracle  on Ice” a true miracle.  Funny thing, I remember thinking we had a shot before that game, because of the way we tied the Swedes in the last half minute and handled the Czechs.  We were on a roll.  But I was nuts, we should have had no shot. 

As a kid, I too thought we had a shot. Brooks had those kids (and the rest of us believing). But in my gut, I knew there was no chance in hell. I remember during the day watching Wide World of Sports (lol...remember that?!….the "agony of defeat"...that ski jumper is forever immortalized at the "agony of defeat guy".🤣)….and I think it was Jim McKay who said to make sure to tune in for the tape delayed broadcast of the game; the game was not shown live. As a kid I didn't catch on to that something special had happened...I thought he was just saying...tune in for THE great game USA v USSR. 🤣

....yes....a true miracle. That's gotta be the most memorable single moment in US sports history in my opinion.

[Blueliner]

 They had many "thrill of victory" clips...but only ONE "agony of defeat". Damn...poor guy.