Chipper
01-04-2006, 11:45 AM
http://www.thestar.com/
Sutter's hockey machine
This no-star bunch is brutally efficient
Jan. 4, 2006. 01:00 AM
VANCOUVER—It's conceivable, or perhaps even likely, that in five years not a single individual from this year's junior Team Canada will still linger in the national consciousness.
That would be unusual, of course, for a Canadian team this successful, a team that has once more qualified for the gold medal game at the world junior championships.
After all, from the '95 champs there were a host of future NHL stars from Jason Allison to Bryan McCabe, and Jarome Iginla is still remembered the best player on another Canadian champion the next year. In 1997, an undertalented Canadian team won gold led by Alyn McCauley, Chris Phillips and goalie Marc Denis.
From last year's team, still a vibrant memory, there were Mike Richards, Jeff Carter, Dion Phaneuf and, of course, Sidney Crosby. Even the silver medalists of '99 in Winnipeg are still remembered for the courageous netminding of Roberto Luongo, while the '03 team that couldn't get past the Russians in the final in Halifax featured the personality of Jordin Tootoo and the goaltending of Marc-Andre Fleury.
This year could be different.
All that may be recalled is a relentless wave of black helmets, red-and-white jerseys and a machine-like approach.
Maybe goalie Justin Pogge will strike a chord with some, particularly Maple Leaf fans. Jonathan Toews, if he's destined for the type of success some imagine, might ring a bell in years ahead.
Or maybe not.
Brent Sutter, the most unquestioned national junior coach in the history of the program, has taken a team with only one returnee and forged a club that doesn't have a featured sniper like Iginla or a stud defenceman like Phaneuf, but has yet to lose or tie a game because of a startling collective sense of mission and discipline.
They simply pounded the Finns into the ice last night in a brutally efficient 4-0 triumph, and once again there wasn't an individual performance that particularly stood out from the mob.
No stars. Just wins.
"We didn't have a chance," lamented Finland goalie Tuukka Rask, a Leaf draft pick. "They played so well. They play so hard with five guys."
There is no No.1 scoring line, and at the other end of the spectrum, nobody noticed when highly regarded Montreal draftee Guillaume Latendresse slipped from a first-line role to a bench warmer.
That wave of black helmets just kept churning and checking and coming.
"The kids stuck with the program," said Sutter after last night's semifinal win. "They haven't wavered. That's why they are the team they have become."
No, this Canadian outfit isn't as blissfully skilled as last year's magnificent squad.
But it might not have to be.
What Team Canada now needs is for Vancouver, at least for one night, to feel a little more like Red Deer and a little less like the culturally diverse, cosmopolitan international city that will host the world for the Winter Olympics in four years.
Red Deer, you see, was the site of the last world junior gold won by Canada on Canadian soil back in '95.
Since then, trips to the gold medal game in bigger towns — Winnipeg (1999) and Halifax (2003) — produced a pair of silvers, with the Russians walking away with the preferred precious metal each time.
Maybe the better team won on both occasions.
Or maybe playing before millions on national television and an overwhelmingly pro-Canada crowd just gets a little difficult to handle for a bunch of teenagers more accustomed to skating before 5,000 customers most nights.
While wealthy Vancouver may not have the community warmth and spirit that made Halifax such an appealing success — and not many Canadian cities do — this tournament has been extraordinarily well attended and yet another in a lengthening series of lucrative successes for Hockey Canada.
It has also shredded for good, one should think, the notion that Vancouver is a fickle sports town, one that couldn't maintain an Indy race and gained and lost an NBA franchise in the blink of an eye (perhaps they'd be willing to take the Raptors and give it another try?).
See, it wasn't that long ago at all that Vancouver, like Toronto, was considered incapable of staging a Grey Cup, let alone a significant international event.
Well, the Grey Cup effort in November here produced a spectacular game and a compelling week of festivities, and the quality of this world junior competition has been an encouraging stepping stone on the road to the 2010 Winter Olympics, an event that is expected to be accompanied by high expectations of unprecedented Canadian podium success.
And if Canadian athletes need to get used to the idea of winning gold in B.C., tomorrow night would be a good place to start, don't you think?
Sutter's hockey machine
This no-star bunch is brutally efficient
Jan. 4, 2006. 01:00 AM
VANCOUVER—It's conceivable, or perhaps even likely, that in five years not a single individual from this year's junior Team Canada will still linger in the national consciousness.
That would be unusual, of course, for a Canadian team this successful, a team that has once more qualified for the gold medal game at the world junior championships.
After all, from the '95 champs there were a host of future NHL stars from Jason Allison to Bryan McCabe, and Jarome Iginla is still remembered the best player on another Canadian champion the next year. In 1997, an undertalented Canadian team won gold led by Alyn McCauley, Chris Phillips and goalie Marc Denis.
From last year's team, still a vibrant memory, there were Mike Richards, Jeff Carter, Dion Phaneuf and, of course, Sidney Crosby. Even the silver medalists of '99 in Winnipeg are still remembered for the courageous netminding of Roberto Luongo, while the '03 team that couldn't get past the Russians in the final in Halifax featured the personality of Jordin Tootoo and the goaltending of Marc-Andre Fleury.
This year could be different.
All that may be recalled is a relentless wave of black helmets, red-and-white jerseys and a machine-like approach.
Maybe goalie Justin Pogge will strike a chord with some, particularly Maple Leaf fans. Jonathan Toews, if he's destined for the type of success some imagine, might ring a bell in years ahead.
Or maybe not.
Brent Sutter, the most unquestioned national junior coach in the history of the program, has taken a team with only one returnee and forged a club that doesn't have a featured sniper like Iginla or a stud defenceman like Phaneuf, but has yet to lose or tie a game because of a startling collective sense of mission and discipline.
They simply pounded the Finns into the ice last night in a brutally efficient 4-0 triumph, and once again there wasn't an individual performance that particularly stood out from the mob.
No stars. Just wins.
"We didn't have a chance," lamented Finland goalie Tuukka Rask, a Leaf draft pick. "They played so well. They play so hard with five guys."
There is no No.1 scoring line, and at the other end of the spectrum, nobody noticed when highly regarded Montreal draftee Guillaume Latendresse slipped from a first-line role to a bench warmer.
That wave of black helmets just kept churning and checking and coming.
"The kids stuck with the program," said Sutter after last night's semifinal win. "They haven't wavered. That's why they are the team they have become."
No, this Canadian outfit isn't as blissfully skilled as last year's magnificent squad.
But it might not have to be.
What Team Canada now needs is for Vancouver, at least for one night, to feel a little more like Red Deer and a little less like the culturally diverse, cosmopolitan international city that will host the world for the Winter Olympics in four years.
Red Deer, you see, was the site of the last world junior gold won by Canada on Canadian soil back in '95.
Since then, trips to the gold medal game in bigger towns — Winnipeg (1999) and Halifax (2003) — produced a pair of silvers, with the Russians walking away with the preferred precious metal each time.
Maybe the better team won on both occasions.
Or maybe playing before millions on national television and an overwhelmingly pro-Canada crowd just gets a little difficult to handle for a bunch of teenagers more accustomed to skating before 5,000 customers most nights.
While wealthy Vancouver may not have the community warmth and spirit that made Halifax such an appealing success — and not many Canadian cities do — this tournament has been extraordinarily well attended and yet another in a lengthening series of lucrative successes for Hockey Canada.
It has also shredded for good, one should think, the notion that Vancouver is a fickle sports town, one that couldn't maintain an Indy race and gained and lost an NBA franchise in the blink of an eye (perhaps they'd be willing to take the Raptors and give it another try?).
See, it wasn't that long ago at all that Vancouver, like Toronto, was considered incapable of staging a Grey Cup, let alone a significant international event.
Well, the Grey Cup effort in November here produced a spectacular game and a compelling week of festivities, and the quality of this world junior competition has been an encouraging stepping stone on the road to the 2010 Winter Olympics, an event that is expected to be accompanied by high expectations of unprecedented Canadian podium success.
And if Canadian athletes need to get used to the idea of winning gold in B.C., tomorrow night would be a good place to start, don't you think?