What It Was Like to Call Sidney Crosby's Olympic Golden Goal

On Feb. 28, 2010, Chris Cuthbert was tasked with calling one of the most iconic goals in hockey history. Cuthbert was the play-by-play voice, on television, when Sidney Crosby scored the overtime winner against the Americans to give the host nation Canadians a gold medal in men's hockey at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver.

We recently caught up with the Toronto native to re-live the golden goal and discuss the famous call that happened six years ago this Sunday. This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

VICE Sports: When you left the CBC in 2005, the consortium already had the Olympic broadcast rights for the 2010 games. What were your thoughts in terms of career moves at that point? Did you have an idea there might be an opportunity at TSN?

Chris Cuthbert: In the back of my mind, I thought I'm going to miss a lot of Stanley Cup playoffs games in the future, although we did the playoffs at that point (at TSN), but not the Canadian games. I was going to the conference final every year and I guess for a while at TSN we were sharing the conference final. I knew it wasn't going to be as good or get as many reps Stanley Cup playoffs-wise, but I did look ahead five years and think 'Wow, there will be the Olympics and that opportunity.' It wouldn't have been there had I stayed at the CBC, so that, and doing Grey Cups every year and exclusive rights to the Canadian Football League, kind of balanced it out.

When did you realize you were going to be calling the gold-medal game in Vancouver?

I knew almost right away when I signed (with TSN). My agent, when he was negotiating the deal, asked me what kinds of things I was interested in. I told him 'Just sign the deal, I'm happy.' When you get fired, you're happy to sign your next deal. He called me back and he said 'Would you like to do the Olympics and the gold-medal game?' I said 'Just sign the deal, that would be super. I'm only worried about signing the deal. (The Olympics) is five years away.' He called me back and he said 'You're doing the gold-medal game.' They didn't want anybody to announce that until… actually, I don't think it came out for about three years after that.

A lot is made about homerism when it comes to calling games. If you're on a regional broadcast you have a little bit of leeway in that regard. Doing the Olympics is obviously different than your average NHL game, but as a Canadian, calling an international event, for a Canadian network, were you able to have a little bit of a slant one way or another?

I think the credibility of the broadcaster demands that you be somewhat even-handed, but I got a little criticism for the enthusiasm level on the goal by Zach Parise to tie it. I felt, in the end, what Parise did only made the entire experience even more memorable, taking it to overtime and taking that game from great to epic. I just believe it's our job to be somewhat balanced in any game. I feel that you have to be balanced. It's a challenge even now as we do, basically, home Ottawa and Toronto games. I still think there's some balance that you've got to have. We're NHL broadcasters, who cover all the players.

I had a very touching moment in the day before the gold-medal game. When we were meeting with all the U.S. players, the American team did a great job of making their players accessible to the media. I remember asking Chris Drury a question and Drury stopped kind of before he answered and said, 'Are you calling the game tomorrow?' I said 'Yes' and he said 'That's good, you deserve to.' Here's an American guy, who I had covered since his rookie year with Colorado, and called some great moments from Chris Drury's career on his way to Stanley Cups—so for him to care enough to say that, and he's certainly not going to get any preferential treatment on the broadcast, but it was a reminder that you've got to stay balanced because you cover all these guys, or most of them, in your day job when they get back to the NHL.

What do you remember about the vibe heading into Canada Hockey Place on that day, Feb. 28, 2010?

That's the most electric of any building that I've ever been in. It was spectacular and you got a sense of what it was going to be like because I'd done the quarterfinal game between Canada and Russia, which I thought was going to be the likely gold-medal matchup going in. For one of those teams to go out before the medal round was unthinkable. I remember vividly the pregame skate and the tension in the building for Canada-Russia—just take that to a completely other level for Canada-U.S. It was pretty spectacular.

What do you remember about the atmosphere when Parise scored the tying goal with less than a minute left?

You could feel the air come out of the building, for sure. I think there was an expectation, I know there was an expectation—the celebration was a minute away—that game, although it was tight, it felt like Canada was in control for most of it. Then all of a sudden, with time winding down, the goal kind of halts the celebration. Now, you can feel the tension because that Olympics is not going to be remembered the same in any way, if it doesn't have the happy ending that Crosby gives it.

Six years later, what stands out to you about the Crosby goal?

It's funny because we had a great broadcast location. People would say, 'Boy what a great location' and I had wished that we were higher up in the gondola. It was a great sightline for the tournament, but there was something about being higher that a play-by-play guy likes, and as it turned out Crosby's goal was scored in exactly the spot on the ice that would give you probably the most trouble from that (vantage point). If I was up higher, I think I would've seen the goal a little clearer. I'm a perfectionist; I think any guy calling that kind of goal wants it to be perfect. I think where our point of view was, it was a harder goal to see than you might've liked.

Then the excitement takes over, and it becomes overwhelming. There was such an audio explosion in the building that actually it felt like my headset had gone dead. I kind of panicked with the thought that, 'Here's the biggest goal I'm ever going to call in my life and they've just shut my headset off.' It was a wild, overwhelming few seconds for sure.

I'm sure you've seen the call many times since, are you happy with the way it sounds? What would you have done differently?

Part of it I like, but I've often thought back to the way the late Foster Hewitt called the (Paul) Henderson goal, I think he kept it simple and I sort of wish I had kept it a little simpler. But a lot of things go through your head and then when the goal goes in, all of a sudden you just kind of forget everything and go with it so I'm glad I thought about the golden goal. I hadn't even really considered overtime. Just before overtime, I was kind of playing games in my head to stay alert. I thought golden goal, if this was soccer, the next goal would be the golden goal. I kind of stopped myself and thought that's perfect. I'll use that.

I feel a little bit uncomfortable because the golden goal is not an uncommon term. I think a lot of Canadian fans were unfamiliar with it and gave me a lot of credit for coming up with it and it's not as original as I was given credit for. It certainly resonated because I heard a lot about it for the next few days and weeks.

Would you have referred to it as the "golden goal" had Ryan Kesler or someone won it for the Americans?

Yeah, I probably would've said 'Ryan Kesler scores the golden goal for the United States.' I wouldn't have said it with, probably, the same vigour.

I remember calling the five overtime (playoff) game between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia (in 2000) and my call was 'Keith Primeau, the marathon man.' I just felt like that was a good way to finish the game. When I thought about the golden goal, I thought I could punctuate whoever scores it with the golden goal and it will probably work.

The younger generation relates the Crosby goal to Henderson in '72, would you say they're comparable?

For my generation, I thought there would never be a goal like Henderson's, and I still feel because of the political and social impact and the journey they took us on for a month in September in '72, there would be nothing like it. When it first came up in the postgame show, I kind of dismissed it as being in the same conversation, but then they started flashing across the country to the shots of the street scenes, not just in Vancouver, but right across the country, and it really took me back to '72 and how we felt then as hockey fans.

Even though the backdrop was different, there was a similar feeling. I did say 'Once in a lifetime' as a kid that followed Canadian amateur hockey and the team going to the Olympics in '64 and '68 and always coming away empty-handed or without the big prize because we couldn't send our best, and the frustration. Finally we got everybody, we got the best players, they won in Salt Lake City, but for the first time we got to have our best play at home.

For all those reasons, it's certainly an on-the-podium moment as a top hockey moment for Canada, all time. But pretty tough to beat Henderson in '72.

I imagine you've spoken with Sidney since the goal, what was that conversation like?

I mentioned where our broadcast view was and right behind us was a bank of official Olympic photographers. Through Sports Illustrated, I got a picture from basically my vantage point of the goal. Through a mutual friend, I got him to sign it. He signed it in the summer (of 2010) and I got it, put it in a frame and it was up over my fireplace. About a month later, I got a call from Frameworth, which handles all of Sidney's collectibles and merchandise, and they said, 'We've got a framed picture of the goal for you, an autographed, framed picture of the goal.' And I said 'Well I already got one from Sid.' And they said 'No, Sidney didn't like the way he signed it, didn't like the pen he used. He wanted you to have another one.'

I was given a copy of the broadcast on DVD and gave it to him the next time I saw him in Pittsburgh. I always thought that was pretty cool that he wasn't sure he signed it well enough so he gave me a second, which was a nice gesture because I have two kids so now they each have one signed picture of the goal.