>
>  Just a quick, seemingly unimportant note:
>
>I saw the Moscow Spartak team play the Buffalo Sabres on a tour of the
>NHL back in the mid 1980's.  It seems to me that they were in the
>Soviet elite league (correct me if I'm wrong) that played against teams
>like Moscow Dynamo and the (former) Red Army Team.  I can't recall whether
>I managed to be there in person or viewed it on televsion, but they played
>*traditional* European style hockey (ie. quick small forward, big agile
>defensemen and NO dump and chase).  Either way my guess is a team like
>this would give a college team fits unless their rink is like the Aud in
>Buffalo; a few feet shorter and narrower, with very small tight corners.
>If I recall correctly the Sabres played aggresive North American dump and
>chase and hit everything in sight and were able to score a significant victory.
>Hope this helps...
>
>Eric Hoffman
>Cornell '88, SUNY-Albany ??
>e-mail: [log in to unmask]
>Let's Go Red!!!  See you at Lynah on Saturday for a Big Red whipping of
>Canadian college hockey just like Napolean at Waterloo!!!!
>
>
 
Actually, I beleive I saw Spartak play last year against the US Olympic team in
 a
few exhibition games.  One was here in Cleveland (well, therei n cleveland, I'm
 in
Ann Arbor).  In any case, the game was actually quite gooney, with a few russian
players going crazy after the American Olympians, taking advantage of the
 smaller
rink, played canadian Junior style hockey.  In any case, a whole ton of spartak
players from that team (the team that came over here) was drafted last summer,
like every other European.
 
--
Eric Rickin ([log in to unmask])
University of Michigan Class of 1996