My Favourite Time of Year

This post is a bit late, but I've been incredibly busy for a long time.

Lately, though, I've just been lazy.

In any event, I haven't even posted to commemorate my favourite time of the year yet: World Junior season.

Every year around Christmas the World Junior tournament gets started.  This year Canada was in the group some called the 'Group of Death'.  Unlike most years Canada, Russia, Sweden, and the USA - what I would consider the 'power nations' in hockey - were not distributed evenly between the two groups.  Canada, Russia and Sweden were in the same group this year with the Czech Republic and Norway, while the USA was in a group with Finland, Germany, Switzerland and Slovakia.  This meant that for Canada, Sweden and Russia there was little room for error.

On top of this, Canada was icing a team that was different than the teams from the 5 or 6 years previous: light on skill; heavy on grit, determination and size.  Of course, when I say 'light' on skill I don't mean 'low' on skill; however, most were expecting a low scoring Team Canada with, in all likelihood, high penalty minutes due to the hard-hitting style that they would likely play.

So, here we are.  Eight days into the tournament, and there are a few things to discuss:

First, Team Canada has absolutely no trouble scoring.  Moreover, the scoring is balanced among the lines in a way that previous teams couldn't have dreamed of.

Second, the Kassian suspension.  I don't want to say too much on this, so I'll leave it at the following: I humbly disagree with the suspension, and the fact that it was extended over the mandatory 1-game was a joke.

Third, the goaltending.  Last year goaltending was a weak spot.  One could argue that it lost us the tournament (if you consider silver losing).  This tournament it seems that our goaltending is, once again, the weak point of the team.  Everyone thought that goal scoring would be the weakness, but tending has been the issue thus far.

Today Team Canada beat Switzerland.  It was a close game early, due, in part (a large part), to their phenomenal goaltending, but Canada came out with the 4-1 win.  Visentin played this game, and I thought he looked shaky in the net.  He wasn't tested past the first period, and many of the shots that he did face were never far from being behind him.  He wasn't strong in his start against Norway either.  Roy was very shaky in the game against Sweden, the SO loss that ended in Canada having to play a Quarterfinal game against the Swiss, and hasn't had a strong game since his debut in the pre-tournament games.  I don't know which goaltender is the 'right' choice.  I don't know if there is one.  Tomorrow we play the United States: a team that has yet to be tested by one of the 'power nations'.  This makes them a wildcard.  The USA won the tournament last year, and they will be looking to repeat this year.  They have several returning members, their goaltending is stronger than ours, and they have several high-level offensive players.

Tomorrow, Team Canada will be in deep against an American squad that just might be better than ours.  There is a reason that they were labeled as the favourites this year.

A win tomorrow and we play for gold.

A loss, and we play for bronze.

Go Canada Go.