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WJC: 2020 Team USA Roster Talk

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Kaliyev sitting when we are down is just crazy. I dont complain about our PP lines because PP worked pretty well. Beecher and Drury are not second liners. Brain fart from Miller gave this game away but if we are totally honest Canada deserved to win today. Knight also need to be better even he saved us many times. He can stop couple of those goals on a good day.
 
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The lines were putrid, as expected. Only line that did anything at ES was the Wahlstrom line. All the others struggled. Caufield looked really bad, but how do you expect him to play his game without playmakers? Thats on the coach. Turcotte and Zegras were marginalized, as well, by their roles. Very disappointing. Did any of this coach's grinders add anything? No, of course not. Goal one was Pinto and Jones. Goal two was Turcotte, Zegras and Kaliyev. Goal three was Robertson. Goal four was Robertson and Pinto. None of his grinders adding a thing. Turcotte and Zegras couldn't play center because apparently his grinders are so good on face-offs and on the PK. How'd they do with that? Putrid.

Knight struggled, and I didn't think the defense was too good either. I liked the third pair, Samuelsson and Harris weren't bad either. Stastney and Miller were putrid. York looked like a player scared to make a mistake knowing he's going to play one shift per period. PP was great, as expected, but we need more at ES. We can't only rely on the PP. You aren't going to score 3 PP goals every game. The team didn't generate anything at ES, which is because of these lines.

I don't think any of the teams at this tournament are great this year, so its fixable, but this coach needs to get his act together. We aren't winning with his grinders in big roles. Not happening.
 
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It's clear Sandelin thinks he needs to prioritize the 19 year olds, which to some extent is true, but it's unnecessary to force so many 19 year olds into roles they don't deserve. Drury and Ford are 4th liners and may actually be successful in that role. He tried them in roles they didn't deserve and it didn't work. Ford was okay but Drury was an abomination. The only forward line that should possibly remain the same is Robertson - Pinto - Wahlstrom.

Hopefully Sandelin adjusts because it's necessary to win regardless of the lines he started with, but if he's stubborn, he'll join a long line of failed USAH coaches that didn't know how to adapt.

The odd thing about his obsession with the 19 year olds is Sandelin just won a NCAA Championship 2 years ago where 5 of his 6 defensemen were freshmen. It's much harder to win the NCAA tournament with a young group than it is to win the WJC and yet here we are.
 
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I'm waiting for the game summary sheet to come out. TOI and FO's is going to be interesting. I don't have a feeling its going to reflect well on the coach.
 
Pavel Buchnevich said:
The lines were putrid, as expected. Only line that did anything at ES was the Wahlstrom line. All the others struggled. Caufield looked really bad, but how do you expect him to play his game without playmakers? Thats on the coach. Turcotte and Zegras were marginalized, as well, by their roles. Very disappointing. Did any of this coach's grinders add anything? No, of course not. Goal one was Pinto and Jones. Goal two was Turcotte, Zegras and Kaliyev. Goal three was Robertson. Goal four was Robertson and Pinto. None of his grinders adding a thing. Turcotte and Zegras couldn't play center because apparently his grinders are so good on face-offs and on the PK. How'd they do with that? Putrid.

Knight struggled, and I didn't think the defense was too good either. I liked the third pair, Samuelsson and Harris weren't bad either. Stastney and Miller were putrid. York looked like a player scared to make a mistake knowing he's going to play one shift per period. PP was great, as expected, but we need more at ES. We can't only rely on the PP. You aren't going to score 3 PP goals every game. The team didn't generate anything at ES, which is because of these lines.

I don't think any of the teams at this tournament are great this year, so its fixable, but this coach needs to get his act together. We aren't winning with his grinders in big roles. Not happening.
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It’s so frustrating. Good post!
 
Our coaches has thrown so many tournaments away so this is not suprising. Only frustrating. I expect same lines for next game.
 
I have a ton of respect for Sandelin as a coach, but I also hate the line combos. A major advantage the US has is quite a few guys that have played together before and should have chemistry, but it felt like a team that was scabbed together today.
 
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I don't even think Pinto played that bad. It was a definite mixed bag. He didn't cover the net on the McMichael goal. He had a number of very weak plays defensively, as well. But he did score two goals, and nearly had a third. If you place him as a third line center, thats not too bad. I think he can play that role. Using him as the first line center is not something he can do.

Drury and Ford, on the other hand, aren't good enough to go head to head at the top level against these Canadian centers. They are fourth liners at this level. The two players who can go head to head against the Canadian centers are our 3rd and 4th line LW's, and they played less than a regular shift today. Beecher in the top six over someone like Kaliyev is also highly questionable.
 
Pavel Buchnevich said:
Drury played over 20 minutes. 5 of 19 in the faceoff dot. All his grinding centers on the top 3 lines were less than 50% on FO's. All played more than Zegras and Turcotte. Zegras under 10 minutes, Turcotte under 11 minutes.

Pathetic.

Source: https://www.iihf.com/pdf/422/ihm422b04_74_3_0
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disgusting. The only thing I can think of is he’s not showing his hand until the games start to really count. Lol that’s the only explanation.
 
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King'sPawn said:


Kaliyev was benched the entire second period. Only played 2 minutes the first.
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SI90 said:
Look at this.
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Not sure the 2nd period stats are accurate. For example, right now the IIHF says Brink also played 0 minutes in the 2nd, which definitely isn't true as he was the one that created the play at the end of the period that Pinto buried after the buzzer. That's not to defend the TOI distribution at all, but these tweets are likely wrong.

Box score says Kaliyev played 10:05 total, which would almost be 8 minutes in the 3rd if he didn't play in the 2nd, which definitely isn't right, so he must have played some in the 2nd.

Edit: yep, I was right. Kaliyev played 4:14 in the 2nd. You'd think a Kings writer watching for 2 players would have noticed.
 
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Throw the lines in a blender... I’m keeping the Robertson/Pinto/Wahlstrom line together and Samuelsson/Harris but the rest needs to change.

Robertson-Pinto-Wahlstrom
Zegras- Turcotte- Caufield
Kaliyev- Drury- Brink
Beecher- Pivonka- Ford
Hall

Samuelsson- Harris
Miller-Emberson
York- Jones
Stastney

Knight
Wolf
Saville
 
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