No, not in Detroit where his Red Wings anxiously await his return to practice and to make them better - rather, home in Yekaterinburg where things make sense and the disappointment in being eliminated from the Olympic hockey tournament doesn't sting quite so much.
He'll be back in Hockeytown soon enough, but before the pressure of of helping the Red Wings into the playoffs and before the minor mending of fences between Pasha and his employers, there are a few days to cool his heels in his homeland that he feels deserved more than what they got from he and his Russian team.
“There were great hopes placed on us, and we didn’t live up to them,” Datsyuk lamented, emotionless. "We can't score today. Hard to win if you not score. We not make enough traffic, we not shoot enough."
Half way around the world and under the weight of disappointment for Datsyuk and his shattered Olympic dreams, Detroit Red Wings' General manager Ken Holland also has to be breathing a sigh of relief as well.
Holland has been careful to say all the right things in regard to Datsyuk's decision to play for his homeland Russian team in the Olympic games despite groin and knee injuries that sidelined him for 14 games before the break for the Sochi games - so he's not going to offer up champagne and cigars now that his star centerman will have a full week to rest...
...but inside, just under the surface of his mask of genuine empathy, there has to be a place where silver linings exist that is smiling at the good fortune that Russia's upset loss to Finland on Wednesday has given his Red Wings.
"He's taken an opportunity to go home for a few days," Holland said of Datsyuk on Thursday. "I told him just to be on the ice Tuesday for practice. We certainly expect him to play Wednesday, but we'll see how he feels."
Thanks to no more wear and tear on the knee, he should be fine if his performance in the games are any indication - a superb effort with two goals and six points in five games - an effort that Holland took the opportunity to praise.
"I thought he had a tremendous Olympic tournament," Holland said. "I thought he played very very well. I know that he's been battling an injury going back to December. Now he's played five games here in short period of time. Hopefully, he'll be ready to play for us next week."
At issue, of course, was Datsyuk's insistence on playing for the Russian team in the Olympic games while Holland and coach Mike Babcock took turns publicly expressing thier anxiety in regard to the injury until he was already in Sochi - at which time they could do nothing but trust their star.
"With Pavel, he has been a warrior for us since he showed up in 2001," Holland said at the time. "I'm not sure where we'd be without him. He knows his body better than anybody, and I think he's earned the right to make the decision based on how his body feels."
Datsyuk experienced the rare honor of being able to defend his country's home ice, the honor of being the captain of the hockey team that played in front of his countrymen but, ultimately, he also experienced an agony in defeat that only those so honored will ever know.
There will be no more Olympic games in Russia in Datsyuk's career, perhaps no more Olympics anywhere for the 35-year-old - but there is a Stanley Cup still up for grabs and if Pasha can lead his Red Wings to the playoffs, anything can happen.
But it seems likely that he will have to lead them without good friend Henrik Zetterberg, who is perhaps done for the season after he, not Datsyuk, suffered the franchise altering injury in Sochi. Detroit currently has a very tenuous grip on the eighth and final seed in the Eastern Conference playoff - tenuous because there are five teams within three points of them in the standings and that slim margin could evaporate before the Red Wings play at home next...
...visiting Montreal, Ottawa and New Jersey before playing their first post-games match at home on March 6th - so it is imperative that they hit the ice at full speed with all (healthy) hands on deck.
The good news is that Jakob Kindl, Stephen Weiss and Johna Franzen should all be recovered from thier pre-Olympics' injuries and back on the ice along with Datsyuk, who will have had a week off to do some soul-searching and to get that left knee rested and ready for the stretch run.
http://www.sportsinjuryalert.com/2014/02/sojourning-datsyuk-will-return-to-red.html#.UwaQIoUcq58
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