Fan In Van

Drunk as Puck

I should quickly toot my own horn to mention that I correctly guessed 19 of the 23 players on Team Canada. The only errors I made were: Jay Bouwmeester (replaced by Drew Doughty), Martin St. Louis, Shane Doan and Steven Stamkos (replaced by Eric Staal, Patrice Bergeron, and Jonathan Toews).

I’ll deliver my speech on Team Canada along with CanucksHockeyBlog.com writer Richard Loat tomorrow, but nonetheless I’m pleased with the lineup Steve Yzerman delivered. It’s a young team to be certain, but speed and youth seems to be the trend for international competition as the United States and Russia delivered equally youthful rosters. It’ll be interesting comparing it to the aging Sweden and Finland teams, who are giving it one more crack at the gold before a changing of the guard.

In the meantime, hockey fans should be psyched at this year’s version of the World Junior gold medal game. While Canada’s entry is no surprise, it’s a breath of fresh air to NOT have Sweden in the finals this time around, as they’ve been the runner-up for three years in a row. And to be perfectly honest, the United States team that is pitted against Canada may have the best shot in four years at knocking off the host squad in the gold medal match.

There’s a lot of speed on the United States with players like Jerry D’Amigo, Derek Stepan and Chris Kreider all being very fluid on international ice. Playmakers like Jordan Schroeder and puckmoving defencemen like John Carlson all add to a United States team which can not only keep up with the Canadians, but outskate them in late stages of the game as witnessed the last time these two teams hooked up on New Year’s Eve.

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In the meantime, I’m not sure how some of you spent your holidays, but there’s one NHL player who enjoyed himself a little too much.

Dion Phaneuf celebrated his Christmas Eve in unruly fashion, mingling with the New York locals in the Big Apple’s club scene:

Needless to say, this was before he found out he was not selected to the Canadian Olympic team.

…I knew it was a mistake drafting this guy in my fantasy pool.