Canada and the United States are set to battle in women’s hockey during a tense time that has seen fans boo the singing of the American anthem at sporting events.
The two nations will face off on Thursday in Halifax as part of the Rivalry Series — a five-game series put on by Hockey Canada and USA Hockey that wraps up Saturday in Prince Edward Island.
The Halifax match — the first in Canada since the series began in November — will be played at a time when political tensions between Washington and Ottawa reach new highs.
Those tensions, started by U.S. President Donald Trump, have spilled into professional sports with fans vocalizing their disapproval of the Trump administration’s actions on Canada.
“It’s definitely an interesting time, and I haven’t taken too much time to form an opinion either way, but I know there’s been games where fans have booed during the other nation’s national anthem,” Canada forward Blayre Turnbull said Wednesday.
“Honestly, I don’t know if that would happen in Halifax. The magnitude of this game is bigger than politics right now. I think the fans and all the young kids in the stands are going to be so over the moon, excited and overjoyed to have the opportunity to watch us play that I don’t foresee any booing taking place.”
Trump’s threats of 25 per cent tariffs on all Canadian imports is what started the riff. Trump said he would impose those tariffs over border security issues, and then over a trade deficit, and then over a supposed restriction of U.S. banks being able to do business in Canada, which is false.
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Trump also said he would impose those tariffs on his first day as president through an executive order, only to instead order a review of the trading relationship before saying he would impose them anyways on Feb. 1. On that day, Trump signed an executive order for the tariffs to be imposed on Feb. 3.
Before that day came, Canadian political leaders announced a series of retaliatory measures, and at the eleventh hour, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced those tariffs would be put on hold for a month while the two countries iron out a number of issues.
When Trump signed the executive order for tariffs on Feb. 3, fans at the Feb. 1 Ottawa Senators game booed the singing of the U.S. national anthem. Fans elsewhere in Canada followed suit over the weekend, and even after the deal was announced, the booing continues.
Canada head coach Troy Ryan said it was “too bad” the political drama has been spilling over into sports.
“It’s definitely not part of the noise within our group. I’m sure individual people may have individual opinions, but we generally don’t bring those into our group. If they want to talk about it, we’ll talk about it, but it’s not something we think we have to get ahead of,” he said.
“It’s too bad. Hockey is just not a place of a lot of political views. We understand people’s concerns, but we’re just here to put on a good show and play against our biggest rival.”
Assistant coach Caroline Ouellette added Canadians “have to be the bigger person” during this time.
“Canadians always act with class. I’m proud of my country. I’m proud of how kind and generous we are. We care about taking care of children, taking care of people in need, we’ve always been that way,” she said.
“We have to be the bigger person, we have to control what we can control, we have to find ways to financially help each other and continue to be a strong country. I want us to rise and be better.”
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