Chicago Sports

CLEVELAND – Zach LaVine tried to handle the moment as best he could.

It started with the booing from the live audience when then-“First Take” co-host Max Kellerman even mentioned John Paxson’s name in a question to the Bulls guard.

“[These fans] might speak differently, but I’m with the team,” LaVine said uncomfortably, as boos quickly turned into a “Fire Gar/Pax … Fire Gar/Pax … ” chant.

“… I gotta put the team first … ” LaVine said, finally getting on the crowd and calling the chants “terrible.”

But the wildfire had spread across the set at the Navy Pier that morning, and there was nothing LaVine could do to contain it.

There was LaVine on Saturday, two years removed from that All-Star Weekend in Chicago, and no longer having to defend Paxson and former general manager Gar Forman. No fire to put out, not even smoke.

There were no questions about his front office nose-diving into another mountain of mediocrity, and not a single chant. If anything, it was quite the opposite.

LaVine sat at his podium in Cleveland not only discussing the idea of the new front office making the Bulls a destination place, but a real contending team in the Eastern Conference this season.

Very telling by the fact that it was LaVine’s second All-Star appearance, but unlike two years ago, a trip he didn’t make alone. DeMar DeRozan was named an All-Star starter, and rookie Ayo Dosunmu participated in the Rising Stars Tournament on Friday.

“I just think they’re always trying to improve the team,” LaVine said of the new duo of executive vice president Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley. “Obviously we’re gonna go out there and try to compete and do the best we can and compete to championship-level aspirations. But I think they’re just gonna try and continue to improve the team and get us better so when we’re in those situations we’re ready for it.”

Maybe they will be come April.

But the fact that it happened so quickly from the weekend in Chicago is borderline mind-boggling.

Rewind to 2020 and that Sunday of the All-Star Game. The Sun-Times was the first to report that the Bulls were heading for a front-office shake-up, with multiple media outlets following suit before the game even started that night at the United Center.

A few months later, there was a name plate that had “Karnisovas” hung on the office door of the Advocate Center, and the rest has been a fluid draining of a swamp, from the front offices, to the coaching staff, and last offseason the roster.

These aren’t your dad’s Bulls. Heck, they’re not even your older brother’s.

And the rest of the league has taken notice.

“Chicago deserves to be that,” former Bull Jimmy Butler said, when asked if he was surprised that Chicago could start being a destination place for big-time players. “I think the Bulls are legendary. They’ve got some really, really good players [now]. … They deserve to win, they deserve a championship just like everybody else does. I’ve got so much love for that city, always will, and I’m glad they’re back at the top of things.”

For DeRozan, a place they would like to take residency.

Nikola Vucevic was the first major piece brought in, acquired at the 2021 trade deadline. And while Lonzo Ball and Alex Caruso were brilliant moves, the DeRozan sign-and-trade turned nice offseason into a stellar one.

DeRozan has long been respected by his peers throughout the league, but what he’s done so far this season has really opened some eyes. It was also one of the hot topics throughout the weekend in Cleveland.

The Bulls have built something special, and now it’s about taking it to the next level and maintaining it.

“I think it’s just understood because you see it,” DeRozan said, when asked about other All-Stars players talking about the organization’s turnaround. “Especially my peers, they know, we all have respect for one another. Going to Chicago, I knew I wasn’t just going to wear the Chicago Bulls jersey and get some free Jordans. We were going there to make something happen. Even if it’s not said, it was understood.”

Which brings everything back to LaVine.

Besides Coby White, LaVine is really the only significant player left from the Gar/Pax Era. He’s had to endure numerous questions about their leadership, about the coaching of Jim Boylen, and about an organization that spent years spinning in mud since LaVine’s arrival.

Facing the national media over the last few days really for the first time since Chicago’s All-Star Weekend, those questions aimed at LaVine were gone.

“It just shows the progression of the franchise and that we’re trending in the right direction,” LaVine said, when asked about 2020 to now. “Sometimes you’ve just got to play the cards you’re dealt.”

Then again, LaVine was due a good hand.

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It’s right there in the Holy Scripture — pretty sure it is, anyway — and the gist of it is straightforward and simple:

With football’s end, baseball shall begin.

We count on it, swear by it, set our internal clocks by it. Great job, Rams and Bengals. Now let’s talk pitchers, catchers and cactuses. Or is it cacti? We can sort it out while watching the Cubs and White Sox play their first spring training games this week.

Oh. Nope, we can’t.

With baseball’s lockout pushing everything back and threatening to completely ruin spring before winter even ends, the soonest we can now hope to see the Cubs and Sox playing games is March 5. But even that’s not likely to happen as owners and players continue to spit into the wind, shoot rhetorical cannonballs across each other’s bows and dare fans to just not care about any of it.

Football is done. The Winter Olympics are over, too. (Yes, it’s too late to start watching them.) Baseball is busy footling about.

What do we have, then? The Bulls, of course, and thank goodness for them. Alas, the Blackhawks are playing out the string with an interim coach, an interim general manager and — one can only hope — a bunch of “interim” players.

College basketball is sizzling along, with Illinois going for a Big Ten title, Loyola on the NCAA Tournament bubble and … well, there really is no “and.”

It ain’t much, but it’s all we’ve got. And here’s what’s happening:

TUE 22

Nebraska at Northwestern (7 p.m., BTN)

The Wildcats don’t win often enough to be picky about how they do it, but considering how it went earlier this month in Lincoln — Purple 87, Red 63 — this is a no-excuses kind of night.

“Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” (9 p.m., HBO)

Grim topics include “sled trauma” — football-like head injuries that are rampant in skeleton and other winter sliding sports — and the slippery slope from opioid painkillers to heroin addiction in young athletes.

WED 23

Evansville at Loyola (7 p.m., NBCSCH)

It’s the final conference home game for the Ramblers before the big move to the Atlantic-10. We’d have to say Missouri Valley life has been pretty dang good to them.

USWNT vs. Iceland (8 p.m., ESPN2)

The American footballers have scored seven and given up zero through two games of the SheBelieves Cup. Wait, that’s merely a one-touchdown lead. Pin those ears back, ladies!

THU 24

Hawks at Bulls (7 p.m., NBCSCH)

As the second half begins, let’s raise a glass to these Bulls, toast to their future and hope like hell they don’t catch whatever is afflicting their riches-to-rags visitors.

Ohio State at Illinois (8 p.m., FS1)

There are four games to go for the Illini, and they can’t lose any of them if they want to hang their first regular-season banner since 2005. You know what? We’re going to go out on a limb and say they do.

FRI 25

Northwestern at Penn State (6 p.m., FS1)

A big game? Not really. But if the ‘Cats are going to avoid having to play on the opening day of the Big Ten tournament yet again, this one’s a must-have.

Heat at Knicks (6:30 p.m., ESPN)

Are we scoreboard-watching yet, Bulls fans? Just so the rest of the league is clear, any and all help from Heat opponents is welcome.

Devils at Blackhawks (7:30 p.m., NBCSCH)

This is the fourth of six straight home games for the Hawks, and who knows? Maybe this one will go a bit better than the first three did.

SAT 26

Purdue at Michigan State (11 a.m., ESPN)

We’re not saying Illinois has a dog in this fight, we’re just saying Brad Underwood will look adorably scary in green-and-white face paint.

Fire at Inter Miami (5 p.m., Ch. 9)

It’s the season debut for the Fire, who have a new coach in Ezra Hendrickson, a new star player in Xherdan Shaqiri, a new logo and a new shot at — how to put it? — not stinking.

Grizzlies at Bulls (7 p.m., NBCSCH)

Man, Memphis’ record sure is impressive. A legit contender? Put it this way: If the Bulls are, then the Grizzlies must be, too.

Nets at Bucks (7:30 p.m., Ch. 7)

When will we see Ben Simmons on the court in a Nets uniform? When will Kevin Durant be back in action? We’re totally here for any and all surprise appearances.

SUN 27

Illinois at Michigan (1 p.m., Ch. 2)

There is no love lost between the Illini and the Wolverines, folks. On a scale of 1 to Juwan Howard punching somebody, this rivalry is up there and rising fast.

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Gustav Forsling and Lucas Carlsson both started their NHL careers in Chicago, bouncing between the Blackhawks and IceHogs for a few seasons each.

A few years later, they’ve blossomed into impactful nightly defensemen for the high-flying Panthers, showing the Hawks what could have been had management held onto them longer.

Forsling has actually become a top-four staple, touting an impressive 22 points in 41 games while averaging 21:20 of ice time, third-most on the team. Carlsson has grown in relevance over the course of the season and touts eight points in 28 games while averaging 12:26 of ice time. Both were in the starting lineup for the Panthers’ 5-2 win Sunday over the Hawks.

It’s another bad look for ex-Hawks general manger Stan Bowman, who gave up evidently prematurely on Forsling in 2019 and Carlsson in 2021. They were included as throw-ins in the Calvin de Haan and Henrik Borgstrom trades, respectively.

Interim coach Derek King spoke frankly Sunday about how the franchise erred in both situations and how they can learn from it.

“[Defensemen often] don’t mature in this league until they’re a little older,” King said. “And you have to have patience. If you don’t, this is what happens. You get rid of some guys that are pretty good hockey players at the time, and they’re only going to get better, and this is what’s happened. With [interim GM Kyle Davidson] here, we’re just trying to [be more patient].

“It’s the [Lukas] Reichel thing, too. We’ve got to be real patient with these kids, and make sure we’re doing the right thing by them. Because we don’t want to get into that [pattern of] two years developing them and then, ‘Blah, they’re not good enough.’ And then [we] move on, trade them and they go to another team and all of a sudden they’re at the All-Star Game.”

On that note, King added he thought Reichel was “OK” in his third and fourth career NHL games this weekend. The Hawks’ top forward prospect might stay with the team for this week of practice before likely being reassigned to Rockford.

“He’s going to be a skilled, high-end hockey player, hopefully — unless we ruin him so we’re not going to try to do that,” King said. “We’re going to be real patient with him. The nice thing is he [got] a couple of games here against some good opponents. We’ll grab some clips and talk to him about it.”

McCabe injured

Hawks defenseman Jake McCabe aggravated a nagging lower-body injury Sunday, forcing him to exit the game for good early in the third period. King said postgame he doesn’t know yet the severity or timeline for the injury.

The Hawks briefly went down to four defensemen when Connor Murphy went to the locker room after taking a “stick across the ear,” but Murphy proved unscathed.

King talks Dach

King gave two interesting, honest quotes about Kirby Dach when asked Sunday if he thought Dach’s ceiling could be as high as Panthers star Aleksander Barkov, whom Dach named in January as a role model.

“If he decides to continue to be a better person, better player, on and off the ice, and work on everything he needs to work on, do the right things and be patient with the process, he could be a top player like that,” King said. “Is he going to be exactly like him? I don’t know; that’s pretty tough. But he could get himself to a status where this guy is a legit hockey player.”

“He’s in a rush. He wants it now. Sometimes it takes a little while. That’s our job to keep him focused and keep him on the right path. We will; he’ll get there.”

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The Blackhawks put up a decent fight against one of the NHL’s best teams Sunday, albeit fruitlessly.

The eventual 5-2 final score — favoring the Panthers — was inflated by two empty-net goals, and the Hawks were very much in the game after Caleb Jones cut the deficit to one with 7:22 left.

But the Hawks also watched closely what worked so well the Panthers and tried to learn from it.

“That’s a good hockey team,” interim coach Derek King said. “They force you to back off because once they know their ‘D’ are getting it or even [forcing] 50-50 pucks — and they were winning some of those battles — they’re out of the zone. They’re gone. So you have to back off. They flip pucks or they indirectly [dump them in, and] they usually pick them up pretty good, and then they’re on offense pretty quick.

“[We’ll] take a page from their book, how they play and how they blow the zone when their ‘D’ get it. That could be something to look at.”

Outside of ex-coach Joel Quenneville’s forced resignation in October during the Hawks’ sexual assault cover-up fallout, this has been a dream season so far for the Panthers, as new coach (and former Hawks player) Andrew Brunette has powered the locomotive with even more fuel.

The Panthers’ win Sunday improved their record to an Eastern Conference-leading 35-10-5, including 17-3-1 since Christmas. They lead the league with a plus-65 goal differential, backed up by league-leading shot-attempt and expected-goal ratios (they’re second in scoring-chance ratio). They’ve averaged 4.95 goals per game since Christmas.

The Hawks particularly keyed on — and were impressed by — one Panthers tactic that involved their weak-side winger (opposite the puck side) jumping up aggressively on the counterattack.

That motion forced the Hawks’ defensemen to back up, instead of stepping up to force a neutral-zone turnover, since they knew an outlet pass over to the weak side could burn them. And with the defensemen backed up, the Panthers were able to enter the offensive zone relatively easily and keep possession for extended stretches.

It was understandably frustrating for the Hawks’ defensive corps.

“They stretch their forwards a lot, and then their ‘D’ come as that next layer and jump up, try to get above our forwards to be that next layer on the rush,” Connor Murphy said. “It’s about having good back pressure and making sure that us ‘D’ have the best gaps we can as we enter the zone. Everyone [needs to be] sorting to the middle of the ice to keep their passes to the outside of the dangerous areas.”

“You can’t let [the winger] go — he gets a breakaway that way — so it’s tough,” Calvin de Haan said. “We’ve just got to try and find a way to sustain a little bit more ‘O’-zone time. Sometimes even if you don’t create much, it still forces the other team to come 200 feet.”

But for the Hawks’ forwards and coaching staff, it was something to potentially adapt in some form into their own offensive gameplan.

King has openly experimented with new tactics to keep this lost season engaging for his team — he added a new twist of more aggressive pinching by defensemen just earlier this month — and will have three practice sessions this week to work on anything he wants.

“We fared pretty good with the challenge,” he said Sunday. “We hung in there with them. The third period, they came and they were like, ‘OK, enough with this.’ They started playing. But still, we were in it…[and] at least we kept it to the point where we could get our goalie out. It would’ve been nice to see us eat the puck in our skates, or get on the forecheck a little harder and not back off. That’s stuff we’ll talk about.”

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A 69-year-old woman was killed in a house fire Saturday evening in south suburban Dixmoor.

Just after 5 p.m., a house caught fire in the 14000 block of Marshfield Street, Dixmoor Village President Fitzgerald Roberts said.

The home’s owner, Karen Seay, was killed in the fire, according to Roberts and the Cook County medical examiner’s office.

“I want to express my deepest sympathies to the family of the victim,” Roberts said. “Our prayers are certainly with them. I also want to extend my thanks to our first responders who did a tremendous job in responding to the fire and I appreciate all they did to put the fire out and protect our community.”

The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

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History can be cruel. An accomplished person who deserves to remembered is sometimes all but forgotten.

That was certainly the case with Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, a multifaceted and prominent 18th-century French figure who was at once a champion fencer, vocal abolitionist, military officer and, perhaps most important, master violinist, conductor and composer.

But Bologne was also Black. He was born in the French-Caribbean colony of Guadeloupe, the son of a white plantation owner and his wife’s African slave, and his mixed race goes far in explaining why he unfairly fell into virtual obscurity after his death in 1799.

“The Chevalier,” a compelling new concert theater work, seeks to at least partially right this wrong. The 90-minute creation, performed with no intermission, puts Bologne’s life and music back in the spotlight.

Music director Jane Glover and the Chicago-based Music of the Baroque are presenting this hybrid creation in a series of three performances in different area venues, including one Saturday evening at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts in Skokie.

It is billed as the Midwest premiere but Bill Barclay, who conceived, wrote and directed “The Chevalier,” considers it to be the work’s full-blown debut. An earlier version, commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, was presented in a stage reading in 2019.

Barclay, director of music in 2012-19 at Shakespeare’s Globe, a renowned theater in London, was astonished to learn about Bologne in 2018 when two people brought him the idea for a possible show, and he set right to work. What resulted is “The Chevalier” — neither a traditional concert nor a conventional play but an interdisciplinary work that leans toward the latter.

The piece, set in 1778, features a solo violinist (Brendon Elliott) and four first-rate actors in French revolutionary costumes who perform fictionalized scenes from Bologne’s life in front of an on-stage orchestra of 16 musicians. The only sets are a table, two chairs and four stools.

Featured as supporting characters are Marie Antoinette, a fine keyboardist in addition to being queen of France (Merritt Janson); Wolfgang Mozart, who briefly roomed with Bologne in Paris (David Joseph), and Pierre Choderlos de Laclos (Barclay), who famously wrote “Les liaisons dangereuses.” Laclos was librettist for at least one of Bologne’s operas and is a kind of narrator here.

In a clever theatrical device, the non-musical side of Bologne is portrayed by New York actor RJ Foster and the musical side by Elliott. The violinist is a fine player, but he was puzzlingly expressionless and he lacked some of the showmanship typically associated with a soloist.

Violinist Brendon Elliott plays the music of Joseph Bologne as an actor portrays the composer’s non-musical side in “The Chevalier.”Provided

The dialogue does what it is supposed to do: bring Bologne’s life into focus as well as the perilous times in which he lived. Much of the discussion focuses on music, but other subjects figure in as well, including the fraught revolutionary politics of the time and, of course, race.

Although Bologne achieved many successes in his life, he nonetheless faced a racially motivated physical attack and state persecution like the Police des Noirs, a 1777 law that blocked entry to France of all people of color and called on those living in France to submit to a kind of census.

To give Bologne such dramatized treatment makes sense because he was such an intriguing and successful historical figure. The downside to this approach is the music, though always present, was literally pushed to the background. In Skokie, the orchestra was at the rear of the stage, with Elliott back there as well because he needed to be within eyeshot of Glover.

In addition, the orchestra performed only full or partial movements from Bologne’s work (14 in all plus two morsels of Gluck and Mozart), which offered tantalizing tastes of the composer’s obviously prodigious musical talents but didn’t allow for any kind of deep appreciation or evaluation. Not helping matters was the uneven amplification, which messed with the musical balances and detracted from the sound of the fortepiano.

One of the most striking musical moments came when Elliott and concertmaster Kevin Case stepped toward the middle of the stage and engaged in a kind of dueling violins as part of Bologne’s spirited Symphonie concertante in G major, Op. 13.

Let’s hope that Music of the Baroque follows up this presentation with a concert of Bologne’s works. In the meantime, “The Chevalier” is slated for several more performances by other groups across the country this year, including the Cleveland Orchestra, and more are likely on the way. Bologne’s star is, at last, rising again.

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Ignore the calendar. March Madness has arrived.

It’s actually already started. The regional quarterfinals took place on Saturday and now we all sit around and wait for the regional semifinal doubleheaders to take place on Wednesday.

The Illinois High School Association’s new playoff format will take some getting used to, but it was time to shake things up a bit. It’s going to be interesting to see what the crowds are like the entire way, especially in Champaign.

Hillcrest, Leo and Rolling Meadows all dropped a bit after taking losses, but I’m still very bullish on the playoff chances of all three. In the past a late loss served as a real warning sign heading into the playoffs, but that hasn’t been as true in the four class playoff era.

Proviso East is back after knocking off the Hawks. Bloom drops out after losing to Jack Vegter (a very underrated player) and Lincoln-Way Central. There were a solid dozen teams I could have slotted in at No. 25, which seems like a good sign for the playoffs. I’m expecting a lot of very competitive games and some fun upsets.

The high school basketball state playoffs are back. Finally. Here we go.

All-Area Team

Coaches and athletic directors, it is time to nominate players for the Sun-Times All-Area Team. Please email [email protected] by 6 p.m. on Wednesday. The All-Area team is made up of the 20 best players in the Sun-Times’ coverage area of nearly 400 schools. If you are eligible for the rankings you are eligible for All-Area.

Coaches that have already nominated players for the All-City Team don’t need to send new nominations. The All-City Team will be released on Tuesday.

Super 25 for Feb. 20, 2022

With record and last week’s ranking

1. Glenbard West (30-1) 1

Dominated Simeon

2. Glenbrook South (29-2) 2

Handled Deerfield

3. Young (20-9) 3

Peaking at the right time

4. Simeon (23-5) 4

Two consecutive losses

5. Thornton (20-5) 14

Won at Kenwood

6. Curie (24-6) 7

Chikasi Ofoma is the key

7. Kenwood (22-8) 5

Still full of potential

8. Hillcrest (24-4) 6

Stumbled vs. Proviso East

9. New Trier (27-3) 9

Challenging regional

10. Wheaton Warrenville South (29-2) 10

Could face the Polish Hammer Friday

11. Oswego East (30-1) 11

Faces Oswego Wednesday

12. Hyde Park (20-7) 12

Class 3A title contender

13. Leo (21-4) 8

Lost to DePaul Prep

14. Rolling Meadows (26-5) 11

Lost to Barrington

15. Bolingbrook (25-6) 15

Red hot at the right time

16. Homewood-Flossmoor (19-7) 16

Handled Lockport

17. Larkin (27-3) 17

Heavy favorite in regional

18. Clark (20-4) 18

Will be a factor in Class 2A

19. Mount Carmel (26-4) 19

Intriguing Class 3A contender

20. Brother Rice (23-6) 22

Beat St. Rita

21. Lyons (23-5) 20

Could face Proviso East Friday

22. DePaul Prep (21-5) 21

Beat Leo, lost to Marian Catholic

23. Burlington Central (28-3) 23

Solid Class 3A dark horse

24. Yorkville Christian (18-13) 25

Overwhelming Class 1A favorite

25. Proviso East (21-7) NR

Beat Hillcrest

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BEIJING — Sheets of paper rained down like super-sized confetti on the bench, which players leapt off at full speed to pile on top of goaltender Harri Sateri with such force that they knocked the net off its moorings.

After finally accomplishing what so many Finland teams before were unable to do, there was plenty of strength to go around. Finland, known as Suomi in Finnish, is now synonymous with gold.

The Finns knocked off the favored Russians 2-1 Sunday to win the men’s hockey tournament without NHL players at the Beijing Games, capturing an Olympic gold medal for the first time in the nation’s history.

“We got what we came here for,” Finland defenseman Sami Vatanen said. “We battled hard, and we got the first Olympic gold medal in Finnish ice hockey history. It’s something something special, and nobody can ever take it away from us.”

Finland had never won at the Olympics on the men’s or women’s side. It last reached the final in 2006 and lost to Sweden, matching the silver from 1988.

The defending champion Russians had to settle for silver instead of going back to back.

“Life doesn’t end with this,” coach Alexei Zhamnov told Russian TV. “There’s still a lot of competitions ahead of us.”

After winning gold in 2018 as the Olympic Athletes from Russia, the Russians competed this time as ROC, short for Russian Olympic Committee. The ROC and OAR names were the result of sanctions for doping and cover-ups across multiple Olympic sports.

The tournament unfolded in the shadow of another Russian doping saga, this time involving 15-year-old figure skater Kamila Valieva. Word emerged after the Russian team won gold that Valieva tested positive for a banned substance in December. She was allowed to skate in the individual event, finishing a disappointing fourth.

Players and coaches from the Russian hockey team and others at the rink faced questions about the scandal and the IOC’s ruling not to hold a medal ceremony if she finished on the podium.

For the Russian hockey players, no matter the name, the silver in the men’s tournament was the 32nd medal the country’s athletes earned in Beijing. Just not the gold they expected.

“On this day, we’re the best country in the world in hockey,” Finland forward Harri Pesonen said.

While the Russians looked like the new favorites when the NHL withdrew because of pandemic-related schedule disruptions in late December, the Finns were actually the big winners. With recent NHL players such as captain Valtteri Filppula, forward Leo Komarov and defensemen Sami Vatanen and Mikko Lehtonen on the team, Finland had the firepower to go along with its hallmark of strong structure, defense and goaltending.

That combination helped Finland go through the Olympics undefeated in six games, including a three-goal comeback to beat rival Sweden in the preliminary round. Finland beat Switzerland, Slovakia and the Russians to roll through the tournament in efficient, business-like fashion with longtime coach Jukka Jalonen behind the bench.

This game ended better for the Finns than the last final 16 years ago, when national stars Teemu Selanne, Kimmo Timonen, Mikko and Saku Koivu and Jere Lehtinen almost got the job done.

The Finnish Olympic heroes this time included Sateri, leading goal-scorer Sakari Makinen, defenseman Ville Pokka, alternate captain Marko Anttila, and winger Hannes Bjorninen. Pokka tied it after Mikhail Grigorenko put the Russians on the board, Bjorninen redirected Anttila’s shot for the winning goal and Sateri made 16 saves.

The Russians got only three shots on net in the third period.

“That’s how good our guys played,” Sateri said. “They played such good defense today and throughout the whole tournament.”

It was only fitting that Anttila played a major role in the final game of a tournament played in a quarantined bubble. The 36-year-old veteran forward spent his first six days in Beijing in isolation after testing positive for the coronavirus upon arriving in China, which has a strict COVID-19 policy inside and outside the Olympics.

This Olympic team was constructed by Lehtinen, who is now general manager after a long NHL career when he was known as one of the best defensive wingers in hockey. Lehtinen always thought it was possible for Finland to win gold and made that feeling known.

“I tell a lot of people, ‘That year is coming,'” Lehtinen said. “You never know when it’s going to happen.”

That year is finally here, even though NHL stars like Aleksander Barkov, Mikko Rantanen and Miro Heiskanen were not at the Olympics.

“It’s still an Olympic gold medal,” Pokka said. “We won. Obviously, NHL players aren’t here, but we still deserved the gold medal.”

There were plenty of similarities to the NHL even without the league’s players filling just about every roster. The tournament was played on the narrower NHL-sized rinks in an effort to speed up games and in a confined Olympic bubble similar to what the league constructed for the 2020 playoffs to award the Stanley Cup.

Games also took place in quiet arenas — not empty like the NHL playoffs but with selected Chinese fans allowed in. A total of 1,288 spectators watched Finland beat Russia in the final, which ended in a raucous celebration in the afternoon in Beijing and 8:20 a.m. back home.

Alcohol sales are prohibited in Finland until 9 a.m. on Sunday, but that didn’t stop fans from gathering at bars to watch. That was just the start of the party.

“It is hard to put in words what this means,” Filppula said. “Hockey is a big thing in Finland. We have come close a couple of times, and it’s finally nice to get the first one. We played a great tournament, and this is the reward.”

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CLEVELAND – Zach LaVine knew what he was chasing on Saturday night.

Now, he just doesn’t know how much longer that chase will go on.

Participating in the All-Star Weekend’s Three-Point Contest for the third-consecutive season, LaVine again fell short, this time eliminated in the first round with a dismal score of 14 – the lowest total of the night.

LaVine’s good friend Karl-Anthony Towns ended up being the winner, finishing with an impressive 29 points in the final round.

That meant LaVine’s quest to become the first NBA player to win the Slam Dunk Contest – he did that twice – and the Three-Point Contest again fell short.

Maybe for good?

“I don’t want to be the guy that’s in it each and every year and then wait until I win it on like the 10th attempt doing it,” LaVine said. “I just think the competition’s fun, especially if you’re in the All-Star Game and you’re here to compete, I think it’s a cool competition.”

One idea he quickly crushed was any thought of someday returning to the Dunk Contest to reclaim his throne.

“I’m not gonna be in it again,” LaVine said. “I don’t have any dunks left.”

Mr. Telephone Man

It didn’t take long for LaVine to reach out and already have a phone conversation with big man Tristan Thompson, even before the Bulls made the signing official Saturday night, releasing Alfonzo McKinnie to make room.

“It’s great,” LaVine said of the expected move. “I’ve talked to [Thompson]. I think he’s going to bring another championship-level guy where he’s been in these games before. He can help us in these situations. With AK [executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas] and [general manager] Marc [Eversley] obviously, they’re going for it. They trust in me, they trust in DeMar [DeRozan], they trust in this group, and it just means a lot going into the last year of my contract that they’re putting a team around us that can compete.”

Fits like a glove

Jimmy Butler likes to joke that he still might be a Bull someday, but his current contract – signed through 2024-25 with Miami and a player option for 2025-26 – screams otherwise.

Then again, as the former Bulls All-Star pointed out, Miami’s culture fits him better than any place he’s previously been.

Considered the “bad cop” with the Bulls because of his tough-love leadership style, what upset the locker room in Chicago is embraced with the Heat.

“I never was the bad cop, I was just the truthful guy,” Butler said of his time with the Bulls. “The truth hurts sometimes.”

What Butler really appreciated about the Heat culture is the vets all have the same goal in mind, and the younger players follow suit no matter how hard they’re pushed.

“It has been [the best fit], but everyone there knows where I’m coming from,” Butler added. “I just want to win and nobody takes anything personal. More than anything now, we’ve got Kyle [Lowry]. So Kyle is the one that comes in and is like, ‘Jimmy, shut-up, stop yelling, I got this.’ He can kind of mellow it out, and he does that for everybody.”

The King

Butler wasn’t the only All-Star that teased about a return to his original team, as LeBron James reportedly said the door is “not closed” on a return to Cleveland.

Wherever James ends up it will come with one addition, as James said his last season in the league will be played with his son, Bronny.

Bronny James is currently the 43rd ranked high school prospect in the 2023 Class by ESPN.

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The Blackhawks-Stars game Friday became the 50th game in NHL history to head to a shootout tied 0-0.

But for the Hawks, it was the first such game ever. It was also their first game with zero total goals since a 0-0 tie against the Coyotes in January 2003, before the shootout era.

The team’s third sellout crowd of the season — the announced attendance was 19,845 — thus witnessed a one-of-a-kind night in franchise history, a game somehow simultaneously the most boring and the most memorable possible.

“I’ll take a lot of those games,” interim coach Derek King said after the 1-0 shootout loss. “Obviously, our guys aren’t happy about that, because they want to score goals. But that’s a really good hockey team and we took them to the end. It could’ve gone either way. I was really happy with our performance. It was a good rebound for us.”

Marc-Andre Fleury became the 36th goalie to record a shutout and a loss decision in the same game, although Henrik Lundqvist, Mike Smith, Brian Elliott and Steve Mason have somehow already done that three times each.

The fact the Hawks hadn’t even been in that situation before was actually somewhat surprising. They’d headed to overtime tied 0-0 five times before in the shootout era, including four times between March 2015 and December 2016.

But all five times, someone scored in overtime to provide the game’s lone goal. Jonathan Toews’ first two goals of the 2015-16 season were actually both 1-0 overtime winners in consecutive games against the Lightning and Ducks.

That trend finally snapped Friday, despite plenty of chances for both teams in an admittedly exciting, back-and-forth overtime. Five of the game’s 14 total high-danger scoring chances occurred in overtime, with a number of near-misses and squandered two-on-one rushes. And that allowed history to be made.

Friday’s game also featured several other notable, if easily overlooked, statistical anomalies and overlooked oddities.

The first period had only one commercial break, as the under-10 and under-six breaks never happened due to a lack of stoppages and other technicalities. The 20 minutes on the clock took only 26 real-time minutes to complete.

Jake McCabe’s sixth-round shootout attempt made him the first Hawks defenseman to appear in a shootout since Michal Rozsival and Nick Leddy both went in 2013. He’s the seventh defenseman in franchise history to do so.

“We did a little shootout game [in practice this week, and McCabe] went down and scored a couple of goals,” King said, justifying the decision. “I’m like, ‘You know what, if we’re getting [to the fourth] round and going, I might call on you.’ He was like, ‘Really?'”

“I was hot this week in shootouts, so King gave me the chance,” McCabe said. “I thought I made a pretty good shot, but the goalie got his knob [of his stick] on it, so it’s unfortunate that one didn’t go in.”

The Hawks deployed a line where a winger (Sam Lafferty) took faceoffs instead of the center (Kirby Dach), as well.

That’s a rarely seen concept, but it was arguably surprising it took the Hawks this long to try it, considering Dach’s extreme faceoff woes. The strategy worked, too, as Lafferty won seven of 12 draws while Dach lost his only one.

Now heading into Sunday’s game against the high-flying Panthers, the Hawks have lost six consecutive games at the United Center, their eighth-longest home losing streak ever. Losses Sunday and next Friday (against the Devils) would make the ignominious streak tied for their longest since 1947.

Note: Stars captain Jamie Benn was fined $5,000 by the NHL on Saturday for unsportsmanlike conduct after spraying the face of MacKenzie Entwistle with his water bottle Friday as Entwistle skated off for a concussion check.

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