Why didn Canada compete at the 1972 and 1976 winter Olympics for Ice Hockey?
It was because of a dispute with the Olympics Counsel over the definition of “professional” and “amateur.” For years the Russians had been sending their best and brightest professional level players, however Canada bad been excluded from sending players like Guy Lafleur and Mario Lemieux, because they played in the NHL. Meanwhile Russia was winning medal after medal sending their best and brightest. This left a really bad taste in the Canadian’s mouth. In the end they decided that they were not being properly represented sending their amateur level players so they decided to boycott the hockey competition of those two Olympics. In fact those years Canada refused to compete in any world competition for hockey because they were not properly represented. Its still unclear why Russia was allowed to send their best, but Canada (and the US) were not. This article sums it up nicely: http://w
