Figured I'd share some of my thoughts from the WJSS. Admittedly I didn't pay much attention to Koppanen or Steen (though it was hard to miss the goals by the latter) so I'll only comment on Frederic and Vaakanainen who I paid close attention to.
Frederic:
-- It was a tale of two tournaments for him, IMO. The first 3 games with the split USA squad I thought he was fantastic...the last 3 games with the full squad I was not impressed at all. Early on, his line was controlling the play almost every shift and he was making lots of good, smart plays. In the later games, his line seemed to get stuck in its own end on most shifts and they had a hard time stringing plays together and weren't generating any real offense. Certainly not all of that is on him by any means but I was surprised at the difference in his success throughout the games.
-- His passing and vision impressed me the most. He reminds me of Heinen a bit in how he can slow things down, draw defenders to him, and then will make a neat little pass (often on his backhand) to an open teammate.
-- He showed strong possession skills at times. There were a few shifts where his line cycled the puck beautifully and he used his size well to control play in the o-zone.
-- I thought his speed was solid for someone of his size....seems like something he has worked on. I do agree with the above poster who noted that he did fall down more than I would like...usually when being pressured by a defender leading to a turnover.
-- I give his defensive game a check mark as well. He was good on faceoffs, good at knocking the puck off opponents' sticks, good along the boards, and seemed to be hustling on almost every shift.
-- Overall, I thought he was a lock to make the WJC team after the first 3 games but I'm not so sure anymore. He was often on the #1 PK unit (and the #2 PP during the split squad games) and took a lot of faceoffs (including near the end of the Canada game up 1) so that might be help his chances but it's far from guaranteed.
Vaakanainen:
-- He only played 2.5 games before getting hurt so obviously it’s a small sample size.
-- The thing that impressed me most was his puck handling. He had a shiftiness to his skating where he was able to deke around defenders on the fly while carrying the puck up. He also had some nice stickhandling moves around/through defenders as well.
-- He showed good quickness with some nice bursts to get away from forecheckers...but the Coffey/Neidermayer comparisons are a bit ridiculous at this point.
-- He wasn't afraid to jump into the rush and did so at the proper times. I don't recall him getting caught up ice or pinching once.
-- I also thought he made some real nice passes, often tape-to-tape hitting forwards in stride.
-- Defensively, he often had his stick in good position to break up passes or poke it away. By no means was he smothering like Zdeno but rather efficient and smart with his positioning.
-- However I thought he was often very passive on the defensive end as well. There were a number of times when I thought he would step up and challenge a puck carrier in his zone but he would give them space and let them skate away…though it’s possible that may have been a coaching/system thing.
-- There were also times where he seemed a bit lackadaisical with the puck. More than once the puck headed right for him but went right through him either because he missed it with his skate or didn’t have his stick down. In other cases, he didn’t show much hustle/urgency with forecheckers baring down on him…one case in particular, Joey Anderson picked his pocket cleanly behind his net because of it. Again, it’s a small sample size so It might mean nothing but something to keep an eye on.
-- His shot from the point seemed well below average to me.
-- He did show some grit getting into a crosschecking match with Cliff Pu in front of the net. He ended up taking a crosscheck to the face and drawing a penalty but didn’t miss a shift. Even when he got hurt (my initial guess was a separated shoulder or maybe a broken collarbone), you could tell he was in a lot of pain but stayed on the bench for the final few minutes of the period.
-- Overall, he pretty much came as advertised. He showed some nice glimpses but played a pretty inconspicuous game…I don’t expect many “wow†moments from him in the future. He was usually on the #1 PK unit and got some occasional #2 PP time and is pretty much a lock to make the WJC since he was on last year’s team (which may explain some of the lack of urgency during these games).
