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4 Nations Thread

A

andyt

Canes Moderator
Staff member
With no NHL hockey to discuss, let’s put 4 Nations stuff here. This is how Canada is practicing today. That 3rd line has no size but is feisty as hell.

Reinhart-McDavid-Marner
Stone-Crosby-MacKinnon
Jarvis-Point-Marchand
Hagel-Cirelli-Bennett

Toews-Makar
Theodore-Doughty
Morrissey-Parayko
Sanheim

Hill/Binnington/Montembeault
 
I love it. Point centering Jarvis and the Rat ... three small guys who play big and are guaranteed to get somebody else's depth line all cross eyed within a couple of shifts. A real change of pace line following their top 6 too. Probably smart to keep MacKinnon and McDavid separated, I'd think. There's such a thing as too much of a good thing.
 
Lines and pairings for Team USA. Slavin paired with Fox…the “what might have been” pairing.

Connor-Eichel-Matthew Tkachuk
Guentzel-Matthews-Hughes
Brady Tkachuk-Miller-Boldy
Nelson-Trocheck-Larkin and Kreider rotating

Slavin-Fox
Werenski-McAvoy
Hanifin-Faber
Sanderson
 
Huh ... no Bash Brothers line with the Tkachuks. Of course, if trailing and needing a boost of stupid, they can always plop them both on Miller's line for maximum salt. Nelson and Tro should be a fun shift disturbing line, no matter their other linemate. And yeah, the US D group is just sublime. Three do-it-all pairings of the highest caliber, even without Hughes. That injury might have robbed us of a Slavin/Hughes top pairing though, which would have been something truly special I think.
 
Looks like Crosby has been cleared to play for Canada, which is good news if only because we won't have to hear every Canadian hockey writer bang on and on about how Crosby and McDavid have never played an internation tournament together from now until the end of time.
 
Finland finally got a practice in, they only had 11 skaters at an optional session yesterday. Per Arpon Basu, the defensive pairings are fluid.

Lehkonen-Barkov-Rantanen
Hintz-Aho-Laine
Teräväinen-Haula-Armia
Luostarainen-Lundell-Granlund
 
As much as they love to play the underdog and given that they've actually got a workable group, it wouldn't shock me at all to see the Finns steal a game even though everybody's throwing them a pity party.
 
Yep, but he's still capable. And I forgot that there is a Finnish goalie with the most non-Finnish first name ever: Kevin
 
andyt said:
Yeah but he hasn’t been great with Nashville this season. But at some point, he’s going to remember that he’s Jusse Saros.
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Honestly, I've watched enough of Nashville's nonsense this season to know that their mess ain't on Saros ... or at least not on him primarily. That said, if he's in any way shaky to start against Canada, then Lankinen has been really good all season in Vancouver. And he's played a lot with Demko being out a fair amount, and he's probably in career form. I figure they'll be good enough in net either way. Finland's bigger issue is that they only had one D in the player pool who could run a power play and he's out. The rest of that D group can probably figure out how to defend well enough, but they're adding nothing to the offense and will be MIA entirely on the PP. That's an issue in this kind of tournament where the finest of margins will cost you big time. But you never can count out a Finnish side that's going to concentrate on forechecking you to death. They were all raised to do that ... every man jack of them.
 
I worry about my Motherland's goaltending...how the mighty have fallen...from Brodeur, Roy, Price to Montemblow and company...yikes! ;)

Such a shorty tourney, no room for error, no room for a game or two to get going, it's go time right out of the gate.
 
NoMich said:
Why didn't they choose that goalie from the Caps?
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Canada runs their program differently. They value people who have paid their dues with prior service and sometimes overlook guys like Thompson that develop late and don't play internationally in the age groups. I'm not even sure Thompson has played for Canada at the Worlds because he's usually been on playoff teams, which is a bit of a lower bar. It's a blind spot, but it serves them in normal circumstances where they have 4 or 5 qualified guys from each position group left home.
 
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