The Canadian athletes who came up short at the Sochi Games

The Olympics can be crueller than a Sochi dogcatcher.

Every four years, we send our athletes off to the Olympics weighed down with expectations -- some reasonable, others not so much. Then, when they fail to live up to predictions, we decry their lack of fortitude and inability to deliver on the big stage. The other "C word" is heard throughout the land.

In some cases, the expectations are unrealistic. An athlete wins a World Cup race in January and suddenly becomes a medal favourite. Another wins an Olympic gold and the public takes it as a given that they'll repeat that performance four years later, as if no one else in the world managed to improve in that time.

But there are some cases where athletes ranked in the top five don't make it past the preliminaries or simply fall flat on their faces -- literally or figuratively -- when things matter most.

While Canada had a successful Olympics by all accounts -- the second highest medal total in our history -- there were several athletes who undeniably will be leaving Sochi with some bad memories.

Patrick Chan, figure skating: It may sound silly to say that an athlete who returns home with two silver medals failed to deliver, but Chan definitely didn't seize the moment. Had he been out skated by rival Yuzuru Hanyu, a silver would have been acceptable. But Hanyu gave him a golden opportunity to win gold when he turned in a sub-par performance in the men's long program. All Chan had to do was skate a clean program and gold was his. Instead, he turned in one of his poorest performances of the season.

Charles Hamelin, short track speed skating: It may sound even sillier to say Hamelin came up short considering that he won a gold medal, but even he would agree that the Games didn't turn out quite the way he expected. To start, Hamelin won gold in the 1,500-metres, arguably his weakest event. In many minds, that set the stage for him to become the most decorated Canadian Olympian of all time. He was an underdog in the 1,500, but the favourite in his remaining races. But it wasn't to be. He inexplicably fell twice, including once while well ahead of the pack. Even in a sport where literally anything can happen and anyone can wipe out or be wiped out, no one expected this.

Christine Nesbitt, long track speed skating: The veteran skater came into Sochi carrying a pretty heavy bag of expectations despite a recent history of injuries. The Dutch forecasting service Infostrada had tabbed her for three medals -- including two golds -- after her gold-medal win in Vancouver. But she went home from Sochi without one medal in her bag, finishing ninth and 17th in events in which she was considered a medal favourite. But considering what a banged-up Nesbitt had done on the World Cup circuit this year, it was the predictions that were lacking and not her.

Short track team: Canada's team came to Sochi with high hopes and high expectations. They were looking to surpass the five medals they won in Vancouver, though Infostrada had them down for five. Maybe the ice didn't play to Canada's strengths or maybe Infostrada was off the mark -- it forecast a seventh-place finish for Canada's men's hockey team -- but the short trackers managed only three medals. And maybe that last sentence puts this all into perspective. There was a time, say all of eight years ago, that three medals in anything was considered a major accomplishment for Canadians.