State of the Union address<\/a>. Thompson met his Sabres teammates late Tuesday night in New Jersey and was on the ice for the team\u2019s morning skate on Wednesday. He\u2019ll be in the lineup Wednesday night against the Devils.<\/p>\n\u201cI was obviously very excited to party and hang out with the guys, but we have something very special going on here, too,\u201d Thompson said, his voice still hoarse from the celebration. \u201cI think that winning feeling that we just got a taste of is pretty addicting. I\u2019d like to continue to chase that feeling and do what we set out to do at the beginning of the season with this group of guys. I\u2019ve been with a lot of them for quite some time now. To accomplish a goal that we set out to do would be very special.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thompson described the last 72 hours as \u201ca lot of fun\u201d and a bit of a whirlwind. In the locker room postgame, FBI director Kash Patel was partying with the team and got Trump on the phone. In a three-minute phone call, Trump congratulated the team, invited them to the State of the Union and then made a joke at the expense of the USA women\u2019s hockey team, which also won a gold medal.<\/p>\n
\u201dI must tell you, we\u2019re going to have to bring the women\u2019s team, you do know that.\u201d A group of players laughed while one shouted, \u201cAbsolutely!\u201d and another yelled, \u201cTwo for two!\u201d Trump then joked that he\u2019d \u201cprobably be impeached\u201d if he didn\u2019t invite the women\u2019s team.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think in the moment you\u2019re just in the locker room celebrating and you\u2019re just excited that there\u2019s people that are influential in this country that want to be a part of it, that are watching you play,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cYou know, we\u2019re all athletes, we love the country. The fact that there are people that are high up in the country that make decisions that are watching the game and want to be a part of it and celebrate, because that\u2019s at the end of the day what it was, a celebration of the country. I think that\u2019s why we were so excited.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thompson, who wore a Make America Great Again hat during the team\u2019s visit to the White House on Tuesday, was thrilled to get the chance to spend the day in D.C. and continue the celebration with his teammates.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone in that locker room is a patriot,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cWe love the country. Anytime you put on that jersey, it\u2019s the best feeling in the world presenting your country and playing for the men and women who fought and serve for your country. We get to enjoy such great lives here, and it\u2019s because of those men and women. I couldn\u2019t be more proud to be an American and do it with the group of guys that we had. Obviously, going to the White House is such an honor. It was a very cool experience and something that I\u2019ll probably never get to do again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of course, if the Sabres manage to win the Stanley Cup during Thompson\u2019s career, a return visit could be in the cards. But Thompson\u2019s experience over the last 72 hours will not likely be replicated. It also came with some backlash because of the team\u2019s laughter at Trump\u2019s joke about the women\u2019s team and the team\u2019s attendance at the State of the Union. Thompson brushed off that criticism on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think maybe when you\u2019re at the center you might not know as much of the stuff that\u2019s going on,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cYou know, at the end of the day, we\u2019re Americans, and we set out to accomplish something that was very difficult to do, and we did it. And you know, we\u2019re obviously going to enjoy that. Like I said before, we\u2019re very proud to represent this country. It\u2019s a huge honor to wear those colors, and I don\u2019t think anyone on that team\u2019s going to shy away from any sort of criticism. Unfortunately, in today\u2019s world, everyone has their own opinions, and I think that\u2019s what makes this country so great is we can all have different opinions and live our lives and be different. So that\u2019s kind of what I see there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thompson had three goals and an assist in six games at the Olympics. He had a few scoring chances in the gold medal game and was a key piece of the team\u2019s power play. Thompson is now trying to turn his focus to the Sabres, who are in the first wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference and aiming to end a league-record 14-year playoff drought. Through 57 games, Thompson has 30 goals and 29 assists. He was centering the top line at the team\u2019s morning skate on Wednesday, but Sabres coach Lindy Ruff acknowledged he\u2019ll need to monitor Thompson\u2019s workload.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll just evaluate as the game goes,\u201d Ruff said. \u201cI understand it\u2019s been a heck of a three days emotions-wise and everything they\u2019ve gone through. Just watch the minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEWARK, N.J. \u2014 Tage Thompson rejoined his Buffalo Sabres teammates on the ice Wednesday morning for the first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":471915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5100],"tags":[1107,229,5133,5,54125,4,2602,1108],"class_list":{"0":"post-471914","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-buffalo-sabres","8":"tag-buffalo","9":"tag-buffalo-sabres","10":"tag-buffalosabres","11":"tag-hockey","12":"tag-mens-olympic-ice-hockey","13":"tag-nhl","14":"tag-olympics","15":"tag-sabres"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116133746043933021","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=471914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/471915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=471914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=471914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=471914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}