Go Canada!
The truth that it will always be more interesting and intriguing to determine not what is present but what is missing gives us a point of view to consider what the 2012 NHL playoff tournament is not serving up. Of the mic'd arm and the man, I sing. Or, without a Canadian team still alive in this year's Stanley Cup odyssey, I don't sing. It has become a playoff tradition in Canadian NHL rinks to let the full-throated fans in on a few lines of the pre-game Canadian anthem. Here is Mark Donnelly from 2007 in Vancouver: There is some dispute, of course, about where the practice started, Edmonton or Detroit, but there can be little disagreement over the notion that the nation that does it best is Canada. In the Oilers' 2006 Cup run, singer Paul Lorieau's decision to stop singing and let the fans take over in the middle of the anthem was stunning and stirring and beautiful. On the few occasions I've seen where that interactivity is attempted in U.S. arena...