During my decade in Europe in the 60's I covered five World Hockey Championships and two Winter Olympics all of them won by Soviet hockey teams. A couple of weeks ago I wrote that these teams formed one of the greatest dynasties in sports histories. Over a nine year span the hated cold war Soviets lost only 5 of 76 world and olympic tournament games while winning nine consecutive World Championships and two Olympic gold medals. It was the way they won that bothered we who witnessed it. Goals were scored. Lots of goals with little or no emotion. Championships were won year after interminable year with what seemed to a token shrug. They were called "The Big Red Machine" and they were in fact machine-like. Despite the incredible individual talent on these teams they were often accused of being robotic. Hockey in the Soviet Union of the time was about the "collective"; a reflection of the political system in the Soviet Union. The only player from that era who was able to overstep the boundary was Valeri Kharlamov but only because he was too damned good. Which brings us to the Canada-Russia gold medal game in Quebec city last week and behold the change. I have seen celebrations in all sports over the years and none will beat this one. Whatever happened to the robots? Probably into the same political ash-can as their system of government. There were great stars in the Soviet Union in the '60's but their individual accomplishments were swallowed up by the "system". The great Russian stars of today are allowed to bathe in their own light. Soviet hockey of the 60's taught us, as Jacques Plante once told me "taught us there was a better way to play hockey". What Canadian hockey has taught the Russians is hockey is still a game, a great game. And winning in this great game is worth celebrating. And in Quebec Ckity last Sunday the Russians did that celebration-thing up proud.