 While the fans hoped for a Canada-Soviet Union final, analysts ranked the Soviets as only the fourth best team entering the tournament. They chose to leave most of its elite players home for reasons that remain unclear. Officially, Soviet officials said many of their players were suffering from fatigue, though goaltender Vladislav Tretiak later claimed the omissions were the result of a power struggle between Olympic coach Boris Kulagin and Canada Cup team coach Viktor Tikhonov and that the former sought to undermine the latter by forcing him to coach a weaker team. The Soviets downplayed the importance of the tournament, stating their true focus was the World Championships and the Winter Olympics. As a result, they sent a much younger, "experimental" team to Canada. Valeri Kharlamov, considered by many to be their best forward, also did not play in the series; at the time of the tournament, he was recovering from serious injuries suffered in a car accident.
