“Are we happy, like sport-wise? No,” he began. “But as a situation in the world, like, I think it’s fair. Olympics has always been about the spirit of peace and like, so that’s a tradition. They even stopped wars before, like, to compete in Olympics. So if they are doing that (invading) in Ukraine, like, a lot of athletes are dying, and I think it’s only fair (Russia is banned). Hopefully, it stops and one day we see them back. Because sport-wise, obviously, for hockey, they’re like a big hockey country. I spent eight years playing there and I know there’s a lot of great people in the country. It’s sad that, like, the politics are ruling over it, but you can’t ignore it. We have to stay strong between other countries, you know, like, unite.”