Oh, Canada! ... Why can’t you get your soccer act together?

So hockey was an oddly cool sport. (Later, I had a falling out with hockey, the way families sometimes do, but let’s not get sidetracked here.)

Yesterday’s Gold Medal Olympic hockey game was terrific stuff. As my SB Nation brother Dave Clark said on Facebook, I just can’t get too upset over Canada’s victory over the United States. Our country won plenty of medals in Vancouver, and Sunday’s win meant so, so much more to Canada. The fans of the United States have dined generously at the Olympic Medal buffet and should be sated. Gold in hockey would have amounted to a second helping of desert. (Except for the relatively small legion of passionate hockey supporters in our country – I understand how much victory would have meant for that segment.)

Related to all this was this piece in today’s New York Times, helping to put in perspective how hockey is de facto religion for our northern neighbors. Obsession is clearly not too strong a word.

That got me thinking -- maybe this helps to answer one of my long-standing questions about Canada: why the country can’t get its soccer house in order?

Canada last qualified for a World Cup in 1986. Some of you reading this weren’t born then (which saved you from the scourge of acid wash jeans; but, again, let’s not get sidetracked). They should have accidentally fallen into at least one World Cup since then.

Quick, who was Canada’s best player ever? Anyone, anyone? I guess I’ll go with Tomasz Radzinski … but I’m open for suggestions from those who know their Canadian soccer. (I do know that it could have been Owen Hargreaves, but he opted to play for England instead.)

Canada is the third most populated land in North America, after the United States and Mexico. It is more than four times larger than Honduras, which will be in South Africa this summer. It is far larger than Costa Rica and it dwarfs Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, all of which have appeared at World Cups since Canada. (The Canadians were shut out and lost all three first-round matches at Mexico '86.)

So, population and available pool of athletes shouldn’t be an issue.

So I started thinking this morning: we only have so much human capacity for obsession. In the simplest terms, if you’re 20 percent obsessed with hockey as a nation, that leaves ample room for making flirty eyes with other sports, football, soccer, baseball, curling, equestrian, etc.

But if you’re 80 percent obsessed, all those other sports truly are fighting for the scraps. I guess I’m developing an understanding of a land that may trend more toward the 80 than the 20.

Again, that’s a simplistic assessment, more “starting point” than “finish line.” I know there’s more involved in a country that can’t sort out its soccer scene. But maybe it gets me a little further along in understanding why.