Time To Panic? The Olympic Hockey Venue Still Isn't Done And There's No Plan B

There's nothing new about the construction of a new Olympic venue coming down to the wire. I swear, it happens every single Olympic cycle with something. That's why I wasn't initially concerned about Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena, which is planned to be the home of hockey at the 2026 Winter Games in Milan.

However, I got a little more nervous when the NHL wasn't shy about its concerns as it prepares to send players to the Olympics for the first time since 2014. They even sent a pair of envoys earlier this month to have a looksee.

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But now I'm really nervous with the word that not only is construction still ongoing, but there's no plan B for the Olympic tournament.

None.

"There is no plan B," chief games operations officer for Milan Cortina, Andrea Francisi, told the Associated Press. "So, necessarily, we have to be able to organize the competition in an impeccable manner at Santagiulia."

Uh… Tim Robinson, I'm gonna let you take this one:

I mean, maybe not having a backup plan will really make everyone buckle down to make sure that the centerpiece venue of the Olympic hockey tournaments is ready to go.

Buuuuuut, I also feel like having another arena you can go to if you run into problems might be a good idea.

The concerns began when the test event for the new barn — standard practice for a new Olympic venue — scheduled for December was canceled and never rescheduled.

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Still, Francisi insists that it will be good to go for February 5, which is when it's scheduled to host its first game of the Olympics, which will be a women's preliminary round game.

"There are daily updates in the sense that our team is there working every day," Francisi said. "The companies which are involved with the building of the facility have sped up their work significantly.

"We’re monitoring all that daily together with them, there’s great collaboration between us, we’re creating a coordinated plan between their work and our preparations, and for the moment we’re healthily optimistic, but 100% we’ll do it."

Alright. Let's hope.

But we'll believe it when we see it.