5 Bruins Headed to Sochi to Play for Teams Other than the U.S.

Chances are that if you're reading this, you bleed red, white and blue like me. Still, we also love the Bruins so it is pertinent information that five players currently on Boston will be going to Sochi, Russia in February to compete for their home countries in the 2014 Winter Olympics.

Zdeno Chara is the captain of Slovakia and will make his third Olympics appearance. Patrice Bergeron (Canada), Loui Eriksson (Sweden) and David Krejci (Czech Republic) got the invites to their second Olympics on three of the heavyweight teams. Finally, Tuukka Rask (Finland) makes his inaugural games and he could be the starter for a team deeper in goaltending than any other.

Torey Krug (U.S.) and Milan Lucic (Bruins) were the only other Bruins thought to have a decent shot to play in Sochi but I'm also a little surprised that Eriksson was picked over teammate Carl Soderberg considering he's been out for a month with his second serious concussion of the season. Then again who knows if Soderberg really had a chance to play for the Swedes.

As always, we'll be rooting for the U.S. first and foremost, but it'd be nice to see all these other guys do well except when they're playing the Americans. I can't wait for Olympic hockey, other than the World Cup it's about as good as it gets in terms of international sports tournaments in my humble opinion.

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