MILAN — The pain was all over Sidney Crosby’s face.
Team Canada has been all but impervious with Crosby on the roster.
They’d never lost a best-on-best tournament with him.
They’d lost just two games at best-on-best, period, with him on the roster — both to the United States and both in group stages of tournaments in which they went on to beat Team USA in the final.
He’s the face of the sport, in large part, because of his international record.
On Sunday, though, what might have been his last ride to gold at the Olympic Games was cut short.
Crosby was forced to watch Canada’s 2-1 overtime loss to the United States from the trainers room, having suffered a lower-body injury in the quarterfinal against Czechia that left him unable to go for the rest of the tournament, as hard as he tried.
Crosby skated with the team Saturday at a closed practice, but the announcement came down an hour before puck drop that Canada’s captain would be scratched.
“It was a tough decision,” Crosby said. “Obviously, in your head, you always want to be out there and find every way possible but not at the expense of what needs to be done. And them watching how we played today, the guys played incredible.”
Reading between the lines of Crosby’s words, it seemed like he may have been physically able to play.
But he made clear that his level would have been nowhere near what was needed to play effectively in a game like Sunday’s, which seemed to be played at twice the speed of even playoff hockey.
“Could go out there, but you saw that game,” Crosby said. “It’s incredible hockey.”
It brought to mind Game 7 of the 2009 Stanley Cup Final, when Crosby suffered a left knee injury in the second period and played just one shift in the third, telling reporters afterward that he may have hurt his team by playing.
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The Penguins got him a win back then.
Team Canada fell just short Sunday, thanks to Connor Hellebuyck’s 41 saves and Jack Hughes’ overtime winner.
“I didn’t know until this morning,” said Nathan MacKinnon, Crosby’s close friend and fellow Nova Scotian. “I wasn’t going to ask him. I know he did it for us. He felt like he couldn’t battle completely. He could have just said he wanted to play and be on the bench, but we needed everyone. He did it for us and the country.”
