This year, however, it seems that professional hockey players are doing their part to get the education ball rolling so to speak, by launching an international Safe Sex campaign in the weeks leading up to the much-anticipated World Cup of Hockey.

This last month has seen players from all countries represented in the NHL “pulling out”, apparently to set some kind of example to the younger generation, although “pulling out” has never been widely recognized as a solid method of birth control.

The last player to do so is one of Canada’s top defensemen, Chris Pronger, who cited an undisclosed injury as his reason, although recent speculation from an undetermined source says that he just forgot to toss a shooter tutor onto the old crossbar and didn’t want to have to deal with paying child support in 9 months, what with the lockout and all.

Team Canada has lost a few other big names such as Ed Belfour, Rob Blake and Steve Yzerman, all of whom were members of Canada’s triumphant Salt Lake City team back in 2002. Lecavalier replaced Yzerman, while Scott Hannah and Jay Bouwmeester will replace Pronger and Blake. Gretzky has apparently been on the horn all week looking for someone to take over the huge void that Belfour leaves in the lineup. Who’s going to fold the towels and fill the bottles? Some stations have reported that the Edmonton Oilers are preparing to announce the release of Joey Moss to Team Canada’s roster to fill Belfours vacant spot, which would be a strong addition to an already talented team.

Other notables to pull out are Mathieu Schneider and Jeremy Roenick of the United States, Robert Lang of Germany, and Team Russia. Fortunately for countries such as our great nation of Canada, we have enough top-flight athletes that can play first line hockey to dominate a few times over, so even in the worst-case scenario I’m pretty sure we wouldn’t go out and lose to Puerto Rico 92-73.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Don’t pull out just suck it up and wear a rubber.

The lads at Gongshow Hockey would like to take this chance to extend our deepest sympathies to the friends and family of Czech Republic National Team coach Ivan Hlinka who passed away on Monday, August 16 at the age of 54 after injuries he sustained when his car collided with a truck 110kms west of Prague. Hlinka played 137 games with the Vancouver Canucks collecting 42 goals and 81 assists and was both an assistant and head coach with the Pittsburgh Penguins. As Czech Republic head coach, Hlinka had a successful tenure, guiding them to two World Championships and three Olympic medals including one gold in 1998.