What Next | Daily News and Analysis · Slate Podcasts

How Hockey Got Drafted into the Culture Wars

·27 min·1 clip

The men's gold medal hockey team got a two-minute standing ovation in the State of the Union chamber.

1. What Next | Daily News and Analysis focuses on how hockey became part of the culture wars after Donald Trump’s State of the Union appearance with the U.S. Olympic men’s hockey team. 2. Mary Harris hosts the episode, and Frankie De La Creta joins as a sports writer and hockey fan whose perspective centers women's hockey and queer experience. 3. The episode asks whether hockey has been “drafted into the culture wars,” and uses Trump, the Olympics, and Heated Rivalry to test that claim. 4. Trump’s State of the Union line about “winning again” is followed by the men’s gold medal hockey team entering the chamber and receiving a standing ovation. 5. Frankie says the reaction did not surprise them because men's hockey culture is “incredibly toxic and incredibly conservative.” 6. The discussion cites VoteHub analysis that reportedly found more than 40% of NHL players registered as Republicans and fewer than 6% as Democrats. 7. Mary and Frankie connect that political profile to the league’s public image and to how easily the men's team was embraced by conservative commentators. 8. Frankie explains that they stopped watching men's sports about 10 years ago because, as a queer trans person, the spaces did not feel safe or welcoming. 9. They describe moving toward women's sports because they wanted to root for athletes they could also see as people. 10. The conversation turns to pride nights, pride tape, and the NHL’s rollbacks on visible LGBTQ support. 11. Frankie says the league first banned pride tape, then reversed the ban after backlash, but visible use of the tape still dropped. 12. They also note that some teams stopped calling events “pride night” and instead used softer labels like “hockey is for everyone night.” 13. Heated Rivalry is described as an HBO gay hockey series based on the Game Changers books, with Shane Hollander on the Montreal Metros and Ilya Rozanov on the Boston Bruins. 14. Frankie says the show is sweet, sexy, and different from the romance usually shown in media, and Mary notes that ticket sales rose after it arrived. 15. The episode stresses that no openly gay NHL player has existed in real life, which makes the show’s storyline feel significant to many viewers. 16. Frankie says the show attracted women, queer people, allies, and other marginalized groups that the NHL had already alienated, while the league did little to change its culture. 17. The Winter Olympics are presented as another pressure point, with U.S. men and women both winning gold against Canada but getting very different public treatment. 18. Frankie says the women’s team gave up only two goals in the whole tournament, while the men gave up two goals in the gold medal game, and they argue the men’s team was celebrated more by political leaders anyway. 19. The tone is conversational, analytical, and politically sharp, with Mary asking direct questions and Frankie answering with pointed examples and dry humor. 20. Fans of women’s sports, queer media, and politics around sports will get the most from it; casual NHL fans who want game recaps may not.

As heard by us

Hockey becomes a test of masculinity, belonging, and who the sport is really for.

The episode treats hockey less as a game than as a public symbol, then follows that idea into politics and culture. It opens with the State of the Union showmanship around the Olympic men's hockey team and widens out to queer hockey storytelling, the NHL's audience problem, and…

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Why hockey gets pulled into fights over politics, identity, and who feels welcome.

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