Friday, December 7, 2001
Fleming relishes role with Oly hockey team
By KIRK PENTON -- Winnipeg Sun
Wayne Fleming has one of the coolest jobs around.
Mind you, the pressure that comes with it is probably enough to make his head explode.
The Snow Lake native and former head coach of the University of Manitoba Bisons hockey team is one of the men in charge of getting gold medals around the necks of Team Canada players at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
The Canadian Hockey Association vice-president is also an assistant coach with the Olympic team.
The much-anticipated Canadian roster is set to be named later this month, so Fleming, Olympic team executive director Wayne Gretzky and director of player personnel Steve Tambellini have been scouting the NHL in an effort to come up with that list.
"The process has been very extensive, very thorough and obviously very interesting," Fleming said yesterday from his Calgary office. "We're very conscious of the magnitude of the selection and the interest has just been outstanding on the part of all the players.
"We want to ensure that everybody is given an equal opportunity to be considered, to be evaluated and to be part of the Olympic team."
Much of the news surrounding the team lately has been goaltender Patrick Roy's decision not to play and forward Mario Lemieux's aching hip.
Fleming, 51, expressed his obvious disappointment regarding Roy's decision to skip the Olympics, but he said he was excited to see the race for another netminding position heat up. He also may have dropped some hints as to which puckstoppers are still in the running.
"I think it's really allowing players such Marty Brodeur, (Curtis) Joseph, (Ed) Belfour and some of the other candidates like Sean Burke, (Roberto) Luongo, (Chris) Osgood, (Jose) Theodore ... an opportunity to really express their thoughts on how important it is to represent your country."
Meanwhile, Fleming met face-to-face with Lemieux last week in Pittsburgh and the Magnificent One, who has already been named to the squad, told Fleming that he will be ready to don a Canadian jersey.
"He's very excited about the opportunity to play," said Fleming. "He assured Steve Tambellini and myself that he'll be just fine."
2002 Games Men's Hockey Coverage
