From Cheating Allegations to Missed Chances for Gold, a Look at Canada’s Winter Games So Far

It was the epithet heard around the world over, Canadian curlers gone wild.

“You can f–ck off,” skip Marc Kennedy told Sweden’s Oskar Eriksson on Friday at an Olympic match in Cortina. Eriksson accused Kennedy of illegally touching a curling stone just after he released it. When Eriksson said the video footage would reveal a violation, Kennedy got even madder, denying he’s ever done such a horrid thing.

The visual evidence, indeed, showed that Kennedy’s finger likely nicked the stone. Then the Canadian women’s team followed suit. Curler Rachel Homan was ruled to have also touched a stone, and an umpire removed her rock from play. Homan disputed the call afterwards. “I have no idea what [the umpire] saw,” she said. The Canadian women’s team, a medal favorite, is 2-3 in round robin play.

A curling controversy at the Olympics? Involving America’s kindly neighbors to the north? As ridiculous as it may sound, the kerfuffle out in Cortina is a fitting representation of how Team Canada’s Winter Olympics is going so far. Canada has a single gold medal more than halfway through these Milan-Cortina Games: Mikaël Kingsbury, on Sunday, won the dual moguls event. As of Monday afternoon in Italy, there were 14 countries with more gold at these Games than Canada, including that mountainous country with so many ski chalets and ice tracks, Great Britain (oof).

Canada topped the charts at its home Olympics in Vancouver in 2010, earning 14 golds, and 26 medals overall. In Beijing four years ago, Canada again won a total of 26 medals, placing fourth overall. As of Monday afternoon, Canada has 10 medals overall, putting the country tied for 10th place in the total hardware standings.

When Lucas Pinheiro Braathen (who grew up in Norway) won Brazil’s first Olympic gold on Saturday, prior to Kingsbury’s triumph, Toronto Star columnist Bruce Arthur wrote, “the Brazilian national anthem being played at a Winter Olympics before ‘O Canada’ seems like a clerical error, as much as anything, but there it was.” A Globe and Mail headline screamed:“8 Days, 0 golds: Canada’s Olympic program heads off a cliff.”

What in the name of Doug McKenzie is going on here?

In 2005, a consortium of Games stakeholders got together and created “Own The Podium,” an investment and technical assistance program aimed at producing outstanding results at the Vancouver Games, and avoiding a repeat of 1988, when the Canadian home team did not win a single gold in Calgary. Own The Podium is still around, describing its focus as “building strong systems around the athletes and coaches—so they can train, compete, and recover in healthy environments that prioritize both performance and well-being.”

Canadian Olympic Committee chair David Shoemaker has been signaling a potential podium issue here in Milan, noting Canadian athletes “are having to increasingly do more with less.” The Olympic talent pool, according to Shoemaker, is thinning out. “With a lack of increase in federal government funding for national sports organizations in 20 years… national sports organizations have had to make tough decisions, and those tough decisions are showing up in a few different places,” he told the Toronto Star in Milan.

Canada’s Secretary of State for Sport, Adam van Koeverden, has put out a different spin, instead insisting that increases in the government’s overall sports spend, including at the youth and community levels, will help develop higher performing athletes down the road.

But what about now? Is it too late for Canada to salvage its 2026 efforts?

Coming into Milan Cortina, Canada was second only to only the U.S. in the Olympic figure skating medal count. But Canada finished 5th (out of the final five) in the team event, which is generally an indication of the strength of the overall skating program, since it involves all four disciplines (pairs, ice dance, women’s and men’s). The Canadian women’s hockey team has reached the semifinals, and will likely face its rival Team USA in the gold medal game on Thursday. But Canada lost every Olympic tune-up game to the U.S., and in the preliminary round in Milan, the American women dominated Canada 5-0. If the American women’s and men’s hockey teams somehow sweep Canada in both gold medal games, President Donald Trump may have a field day. Trade wars and threatening to block the Gordie Howe International Bridge opening could just be the beginning.

Ironically, Canada’s hope may hinge on the cursing curler: Kennedy’s team is 4-1 in round robin play.

If the Olympics end in disappointment, at least Canada can look towards soccer ahead of this summer’s World Cup, as it joins Mexico and the U.S. as one of three host countries. But Canada is making just its third ever men’s World Cup appearance. Its highest finish is 24th.

Global soccer, it turns out, is another tough podium to own.

— with reporting by Alice Park