Vancouver is a long way from New England, but Red Sox fans are already making the presence known at the 2010 Winter Olympics.
On Saturday, Vermont native and skier Hannah Kearney, 23, won a gold medal in women's moguls, becoming the first U.S. athlete to take top honors this year.
That's cool enough, but then as Bostonist points out, Kearney revealed last night during an interview with Bob Costas that she's a huge Red Sox fan -- big enough, in fact, to wear a Jacoby Ellsbury shirt T-shirt under her U.S. team jacket during the opening ceremony.
I'm still trying track down video of the interview, but as this early piece with NBC Nightly News shows, Kearney appears to be pretty down to earth:
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The Red Sox connection doesn't end there. Mens moguls skier Michael Morse, of Duxbury, Mass., made a run Sunday while the loudspeakers blasted the Dropkick Murphys' "Shipping Up to Boston," which hopefully has destroyed any remaining chance that Red Sox fans view "Sweet Caroline" as their anthem. He finished 15th, but that's still showing plenty of pride and spirit.
As this profile points out, Morse also threw out the opening pitch in a Red Sox game at Fenway Park on May 19, 2008 -- a game already famous for another reason, Jon Lester's no-hitter.
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Thanks to Patrick Brough for the tip.