So last night may have been the greatest night overall in Winter Olympics history, at least for the US (and in a few ways for folks not from the US, though I imagine Kim Dong Sung and the majority of South Koreans don't think so). Among the notables:

US Rules Skeleton Tragedy and triumph with the men, and Home Depot's favorite daughter striking medals with one of Ohio's finest. And and Irish guy finished 4th! Yeah baby! Now if we could just get Duncan Kennedy to come up with a new comment other than how snow slows sleds...

Who Wants to Work for the ISU? First all the figure skating crap, now it seems we can't get a men's short track final without controversy. It's international sporting's answer to Enron! At least the long track skaters are keeping it normal.

Speaking of Speed Skating They must have taken all the karma meant for the US alpine ski team.

The Triumph of the Hyphenated American African-, Cuban-, Mexican-, Transplant Recipient-, Raised By Hippies-, Mono Infected-, the list goes on.

The Best Event Not Shown on NBC Ice Hockey. You thought I was going to say curling, didn't you? That gets a close second. Though technically, ice hockey has popped up on NBC, but only (a) late, and (b) showcasing Americans. To get the full taste of yesterday's incredible day of puck-chasing, you needed the full family of NBC cable options.

Which is too bad, as you would have missed two great defensive games (Russia beating the Czechs 1-0 and Canada besting Finland 2-1), a smackdown (US over Germany 5-0), and the second biggest upset in Olympic hockey history (Belarus- yeah, Belarus- topping the Swedes 4-3 on one of the weakest goals let up in the tournament). The US gets a Russian rematch (22 years TO THE DAY of the Miracle on Ice) while Canada gets the free pass to the gold medal game by playing Belarus. Or do they?

Thanks for nothing, Coca-Cola! Speaking of curling, we were watching the US-Switzerland match on CNBC, but were on NBC when Coke did their "let's try to recapture the moment and fail" bit by playing highlights over music, which worked much better at Sydney thanks to the almost infinitely better song ("Beautiful Day" by U2, as opposed to something I guess is called "Another Perfect Day" by some whiners). Anyway, one of the clips they showed was the Swiss women curlers celebrating. No need to turn back to CNBC now! And where's my Pepsi at?

The Croatian Sensation Janica Kostelic is Queen of the Mountain with golds in combined and slalom, and a silver in Super G. One wonders if she'll strip down like her countryman did in celebrating his Wimbledon title.

Even Jimmy Roberts didn't suck! His bit on US success at this Games was hardly memorable (it took me a minute to even remember what he talked about), but it wasn't the usual combination of travesty and crap he pushes. Unfortunately for him, Jim McKay wallowed neck-deep in pathos in relating the story of the Shea family, but did so with more success than anyone at NBC would ever achieve.

So yeah, a fun day. A couple of other notes;

1. If anyone I know watches Julia Louis-Dreyfus's new sitcom, I will pummel them. Then again, if the ads indicate the level of "humor" to be found on the show, it may not last as long as Hank Azaria's sitcom did. And how many of you even noticed that Azaria had a sitcom other than The Simpsons?

2. US-Canada women's ice hockey gold medal game today. WATCH IT.