How to watch Sunday’s World Cup of Hockey 2016 games: Russia, Team North America debut

If you turned your TV off halfway through Team USA’s awful 3-0 loss to Team Europe (who is the oldest team in the tournament, BTW) and vowed not to watch a minute more of the World Cup of Hockey, I would understand where you were coming from.

If you watched Team Canada’s masterful 6-0 dismantling of the Czech Republic, complete with Alex Pietrangelo goal, you may have a different outlook on this tournament. No, not “give Canada the damn trophy already,” though I did have that thought last night. But if after watching that game you realized that maybe this tournament has some potential for fun and it won’t (just) be a long, slow slog towards the revamping of USA Hockey’s international team plan, then today will be a treat.

Team Sweden, featuring Patrik Berglund, will be taking on Team Russia, featuring Vladimir Tarasenko. The game will be broadcast on ESPN at 2:00 Central, making it the first WCoH game on the main network due to college football making it impossible to force people to watch Team USA on ESPN yesterday.

Team North America, with defenseman Colton Parayko, will play Team FInland and Jori Lehtera. That one is on ESPN 2 at 7:00, which directly conflicts with the Emmy Awards. I know which one of the two I’ll be watching, and I don’t think it’ll be the one where Modern Family wins best comedy again.