The Tribune

SOCHI, Russia — Sochi Games organiser Dmitry Chernyshenko has turned to the same line again and again when asked to describe how he and certain other Russians feel about the US Olympic hockey team.

To paint a simple picture, he says he can recall only three horror films from his youth. Those include “Friday the 13th” and “A Nightmare on Elm Street.” The third, he says, is “Miracle on Ice,” a film depicting the United States’ unlikely victory over the Soviet Union at the 1980 Olympics during the Cold War.

We get it. That loss was painful, a stinging blow to the players and their Mother Russia. The good thing is that many Russians at these Olympics are too young to remember it. Or maybe they have just moved on.

Whichever it is, no hockey zealots were cheering against the United States as it played the Russian team in Saturday’s preliminary-round game.

There appeared to be no palpable animosity between the teams or their fans. There were a few scuffles on the ice, but no real fights. No deep-seated acrimony here: It turned out to be a lovely afternoon of hard-nosed hockey on the shores of the Black Sea.

Several Russian fans couldn’t even imagine a heated rivalry re-emerging between the teams.

“Rivalry, why?” said Sergei Mirnov, a construction equipment salesman. “I don’t think that there is any rivalry. If there is, it has nothing to do with sports.”

He is absolutely right. Though the relationship between the United States and Russia has grown increasingly tense, none of that stress has trickled down to its playing fields, at least not yet. Right now, any US-Russia rivalry would be driven not by hockey sticks or skis or figure skates, but by politics.

Russia has given National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden asylum. Last summer, President Vladimir Putin passed a law prohibiting the transmission of “gay propaganda” to children, prompting dozens of gay rights groups to protest. The two nations can’t agree about the placement of missile defence systems in Europe.

Many hockey fans here see those issues as a personal fight between Putin and President Barack Obama, and they want to be left out of it. Instead, on Saturday, they wanted to cheer.

Good-natured fans from both countries packed the stands at the Bolshoi Ice Dome. Every Russian flag within a 100-mile radius seemed to be in the arena, waved by a fan wearing white, red and blue, or whose face was painted white, red and blue, or who was wearing a wig of white, red and blue.

Though seemingly outnumbered 10 to 1, Americans also wore patriotic colors and waved their flags, chanting “USA! USA!” after each goal.

To that, the Russians shouted back, “Russ-ee-ah! Russ-ee-ah!” — sometimes so loudly that the arena’s seats vibrated.

The Russians grew quiet after the United States won in a shootout, 3-2. But a few minutes later, as they exited the building, some of those fans began singing and chanting again. It was as if the game had been just a game and didn’t stand for anything deeper. And that was, frankly, nice.

“There are many differences and misunderstandings between our two countries,” said Alexander Kurynov, who wore a wavy white goat’s hair wig and was dressed in a giant sheepskin poncho that he had painted to look like Russia’s white, red and blue flag.

“But right now, we both believe in the same thing: sports,” he said. “I absolutely think sports and politics should remain separate.”

But that hasn’t stopped Obama and Putin from competing, or at least chiding each other.

Obama declined, unlike several other heads of state, to attend the opening ceremony. The night of that ceremony, Putin watched as the Olympic torch was lit by Irina Rodnina, an Olympic gold medalist figure skater who had posted a controversial photo of Obama and the first lady on Twitter. The photo was doctored to include a banana. (First, Rodnina defended the post, calling it free speech. Shortly after she lit the torch, she apologised and said her account had been hacked.)

On Saturday, Putin showed up at the United States versus Russia hockey game. He stood high above the ice with Thomas Bach, the new International Olympic Committee president, who gave a strong speech at these Games about sports being devoid of any politics.

Putin cheered for neither side, and didn’t boo, either. Only once, when Russia missed a shot in the final moments of the game, did Putin throw his head back and bite his lip, but his face quickly returned to its neutral look of stone.

Below him, the Russians continued to wave their flags. The Americans continued to wave their flags. Together, they turned the stands into a roiling sea of red, white and blue.

Politics? What politics?

By JULIET MACUR

c.2014 New York Times News Service