Canada no. 1

[Cellee]

Yup. Their fighting spirit reminds me of Canadians. I like the Danes ever since the 2015 WJC but that's more of a little brother/underdog love.

I have so much respect for Finnish hockey.

Yup. It is great to see some elite offence coming lately. That junior team was fun to watch!

 

[snipes]

Yup. It is great to see some elite offence coming lately. That junior team was fun to watch!

They will become our greatest rivals very soon. We can never underestimate Suomi.

 

[Conspiracy Theorist]

I'm liking the success of Finland in the juniors despite not winning gold today.

 

[snipes]

Listening to Wagon Wheel by Darius Rucker, having a beer and thinking about the Gold win. Feels good man.

 

[hammerwielder]

Kind of dismayed at all the fanboy boasting on here about Canadian superiority. Where were you guys when we got knocked out of the tournament in the quarter-finals five years in a row between 2010 and 2014? This nonsense about our C team beating any other team is embarrassing. The simple fact is that the Canadian team had the most talented roster each of the last two years by a fairly wide margin and thankfully played to form. They split two games with a talented young Finnish team, had a good measure of trouble with a young American team that had very little depth and never had to face either the Czechs or Russians, both of whom had good teams. Personally I was scared stiff of the Russian squad's firepower, especially as the tournament wore on.

Don't get me wrong, it's fantastic to win the tournament twice in a row after the Olympics and nobody can take it away from us, but let's give credit where it's due.

 

[um]

canada had a-team, eazy to win with a-team.

it's highly possible that 0 of the players make team Canada for the World Cup.

 

[DadBod]

As a Canadian, Finland is my 2nd favorite country. I cheer for them, and hope we draft many Fins.

 

[Scotty B]

The developing nations like Kazakstan(spelling?) had alot of Canadians in their teams this tournament.

2 Canadians I believe, both on their top line though

 

[BlitzSnipe]

Congratulations to Team Canada! Well-deserved Gold medal. Too bad there was no Russia-Canada final, hopefully we'll have that sometime soon. Also, Team Finland had an excellent tournament and I would've also been happy to see them win, but still, Silver is an excellent result.

 

[tade]

it's highly possible that 0 of the players make team Canada for the World Cup.

Perry, Marchand, O'Reilly, Duchene, Hall, or Stone all have pretty good chances.

 

[Chaos Giraffe]

A copy paste though from another post I made about swedish players declining the invitation. I present you two rosters better than what Canada Sent:


Team "Stanley":
Drouin-Crosby-Schwartz
Marleau-Thornton-Stamkos
Bonino-Couture-Perron
Fabbri-Fehr-Brouwer

Letang-Burns
Vlasic-Pietrangelo
Bouwmeester-Parayko

Fluery
Jones

I know you copy-pasted, and this is just me nit-picking, but Bonino is American and has played for Team USA in International tournaments.

 

[iCanada]

I know you copy-pasted, and this is just me nit-picking, but Bonino is American and has played for Team USA in International tournaments.

Good Catch.

I suppose you replace him with neufie Alex Killorn.

 

[boredmale]

The Iron Sheik disagrees

 

[team canada fan]

hard to argue, with last two Olympics and last two World Championships.
and those are one game, winner-take-all finals. Much can happen in a one game, winner-take-everything, final game.

If best on best, and a 7 game series, I think only the Americans and Swedes could threaten Canada's world hockey superiority, and even then, I would bet on team Canada in a best of 7, every time. The fact that the finals at world cup will be best of three, makes me very confident of a team Canada victory, assuming that they get by the perilous one game semi-final game. I don't like anyone else's chances to beat team Canada twice in a three game series.

 

[Finnswiss]

Because I was born in Finland and my father was Finn I hoped Finland can win this time but Canada was the better team and deserved the title no question. Finland was not able to create enough danger in front of the canadian goal because Canada didn't allow it.

Canada is the biggest hockey nation and it will be always difficult to beat them. They are not only the number 1 in the ranking also considering the number of hockey players. I mean Canada has always a "natural" advantage compared to Finland. To illustrate this fact here are the official numbers according to IIHF.com:

Canada: total players: 721'504, male: 116'884, juniors: 518'008
Finland: total players: 75'871, male: 29'683, juniors: 39'731

As you can see Canada has almost 10 times more players and almost 4 times more male players and almost 13 times more junior players than Finland. I don't know of course how many of them play ice hockey on a professionel level and how many juniors decide to become a professional ice hockey player in both countries. But there are surely more in Canada than in Finland.
It's logical that the range of good and talented players is always bigger than in Finland and the chances that Canada can produce more or at least as many high skilled and talented players as Finland is among such more players also bigger.

From this point of view the junior titles of Finland are amazing but nobody can expect that Finland can every year compete or keep up with a hockey nation like Canada. There is sometimes a very high skilled and talented generation in Finland that can beat Canada but not every year.

 

[Conspiracy Theorist]

Because I was born in Finland and my father was Finn I hoped Finland can win this time but Canada was the better team and deserved the title no question. Finland was not able to create enough danger in front of the canadian goal because Canada didn't allow it.

Canada is the biggest hockey nation and it will be always difficult to beat them. They are not only the number 1 in the ranking also considering the number of hockey players. I mean Canada has always a "natural" advantage compared to Finland. To illustrate this fact here are the official numbers according to IIHF.com:

Canada: total players: 721'504, male: 116'884, juniors: 518'008
Finland: total players: 75'871, male: 29'683, juniors: 39'731

As you can see Canada has almost 10 times more players and almost 4 times more male players and almost 13 times more junior players than Finland. I don't know of course how many of them play ice hockey on a professionel level and how many juniors decide to become a professional ice hockey player in both countries. But there are surely more in Canada than in Finland.
It's logical that the range of good and talented players is always bigger than in Finland and the chances that Canada can produce more or at least as many high skilled and talented players as Finland is among such more players also bigger.

From this point of view the junior titles of Finland are amazing but nobody can expect that Finland can every year compete or keep up with a hockey nation like Canada. There is sometimes a very high skilled and talented generation in Finland that can beat Canada but not every year.

With those numbers it's amazing how Canada doesn't win every year.

 

[Jablkon]

Because I was born in Finland and my father was Finn I hoped Finland can win this time but Canada was the better team and deserved the title no question. Finland was not able to create enough danger in front of the canadian goal because Canada didn't allow it.

Canada is the biggest hockey nation and it will be always difficult to beat them. They are not only the number 1 in the ranking also considering the number of hockey players. I mean Canada has always a "natural" advantage compared to Finland. To illustrate this fact here are the official numbers according to IIHF.com:

Canada: total players: 721'504, male: 116'884, juniors: 518'008
Finland: total players: 75'871, male: 29'683, juniors: 39'731

As you can see Canada has almost 10 times more players and almost 4 times more male players and almost 13 times more junior players than Finland. I don't know of course how many of them play ice hockey on a professionel level and how many juniors decide to become a professional ice hockey player in both countries. But there are surely more in Canada than in Finland.
It's logical that the range of good and talented players is always bigger than in Finland and the chances that Canada can produce more or at least as many high skilled and talented players as Finland is among such more players also bigger.

From this point of view the junior titles of Finland are amazing but nobody can expect that Finland can every year compete or keep up with a hockey nation like Canada. There is sometimes a very high skilled and talented generation in Finland that can beat Canada but not every year.

Those numbers predetermine Canada to be top competitor. Still you need great development program to have the best team. Days when Canada lived just from quantity are gone for quite a long time.

 

[Canuckistani]

With those numbers it's amazing how Canada doesn't win every year.

One can only field a couple dozen of those 721,000 at a time.

 

[Macman]

One can only field a couple dozen of those 721,000 at a time.

They never seem to get this.

 

[Malcolm]

Good Catch.

I suppose you replace him with neufie Alex Killorn.

Killorn is from Nova Scotia.

 

[Yakushev72]

As a Finn now i feel awful, sad, beaten, weak.

But every time Canada wins it`s great because this is Canada`s game

Canada has given us Gretzky, Lemieux, Messier, Yzerman, Sakic, Bourque, Brodeur, Roy, Stevens, Francis, Macinnis, Gilmour, Neely, Belfour, & many many more

Better team won today, Finland had amazing team and tournament, but in the end Canada was so much better today.

Thank you team Finland and congratulations to Canada

This is precisely why Finland is very reliable about losing to Canada in the big game. The psychology is that they are beaten before they leave the locker room. They always have an all-out, emotional effort against Russia, who they don't fear, and then fold up the tent against Canada in the big game. Russia deserves all the criticism it receives for managing to lose to a team that is defense only, and has no offensive punch at all!

Sunday's GMG was a pathetic effort in which Finland rarely left their own defensive zone. Give credit to Canada for a really sound strategy of forechecking 3 or 4 guys deep, in recognition of the fact that Finland is offensively challenged, and can't control the puck long enough to even clear their zone. But is this a matter of Canadian greatness, or just the total lack of any kind of credible opposition in this sport?

 

[Yakushev72]

One can only field a couple dozen of those 721,000 at a time.

His point is very accurate, even though you chose to flip it off. How is it even possible that Canada fails to win Gold in every international tournament? There is no excuse for a Silver, and pursuing an answer to it might actually fix some problems that prevent 100% supremacy.

 

[Canuckistani]

How is it even possible that Canada fails to win Gold in every international tournament?

Because all nations field 25 players at a time - not 721,000 or 80,000 - and several nations have produced enough top-end talent to compete.

When you consider that all nations field one team at a time, and combine that with the nature of single-game-elimination, then I'd say Canada is doing quite well for itself internationally. I'm quite content at any rate.

If the total number of players decided who won then Brazil would win most World Cups (and certainly every Copa America), while Uruguay wouldn't be a position to compete with anyone.

Or to put it in military terms...the Russian Army could crush the Dutch Army in a one-on-one battle. But it would be a much more even fight if you had one division of Russians vs one division of Dutch.

 

[Ilyeu]

Because all nations field 25 players at a time - not 721,000 or 80,000 - and several nations have produced enough top-end talent to compete.

Best post to counter the "500,000" critique, I've ever read. Right to the bottom line.

 

[JackSlater]

Because all nations field 25 players at a time - not 721,000 or 80,000 - and several nations have produced enough top-end talent to compete.

When you consider that all nations field one team at a time, and combine that with the nature of single-game-elimination, then I'd say Canada is doing quite well for itself internationally. I'm quite content at any rate.

If the total number of players decided who won then Brazil would win most World Cups (and certainly every Copa America), while Uruguay wouldn't be a position to compete with anyone.

Or to put it in military terms...the Russian Army could crush the Dutch Army in a one-on-one battle. But it would be a much more even fight if you had one division of Russians vs one division of Dutch.

It's an easy concept. Canada has the most players, and the largest number of elite players, but you can only select at most 25 players. Add in that anything can happen in any individual game, and Canada can lose to any team that has competent players.