Were the projected standings correct? Were the projected scores close?

I'm as much of a hater of sports with a judged score component as anyone, but the fact is that athletes can screw up, and no matter how much the prognosticators think they know, until you get out there and do it, you really don't know for sure. And, as we all know, the judges don't always see things the same way the rest of the world expects them to. I'd say the time wasted on doing scoring projections is more an indicator of stupid analysts with too much time on their hands rather than an indictment of the event.

Re: North American dominance of women's ice hockey, it's not like this situation is unique in the history of athletic competition. Canada basically slaughtered all comers in the early days of men's ice hockey, but eventually some other countries caught up, and now Canada may be heading for an early exit at the hands of Russia this week (U-S-A! U-S-A!)

I think the same dynamic could happen in the womens' game in the next decade or so -- it's not like the women have had a lot of time to build up their programs the way the men have, and Sweden has some success in recent years.

There are plenty of other examples where a small number of countries make a laughing stock of the rest of the world in a given sport, but that doesn't mean you stop trying. China and South Korea own table tennis. Badminton is China's to lose. The U.S. dominated basketball for a long time. Were any of these as uncompetitive as a Germany vs. Canada women's ice hockey game? Probably not, but the women have only had 3 Olympiads to get things going. Let's not pronounce the sport dead. Besides, the Canadian ladies still have plenty of time to cough one up the way the men did last night!