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Olympics: OV on Team Canada?

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daver

Registered User
Apr 4, 2003
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Interesting discussion on TSN asking whether OV would have made TC better or worse given their gameplan. Stamkos was also mentioned as someone whose game may not have been a great fit.
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so dumb if you think ovechkin doesn't make the team better. he would have to buy into the shorter shifts aspect
 
I've got to go with worse. What made Canada so formidable was that they had 14 forwards buying in to playing hard at both ends of the ice. I'm just not convinced Ovechkin would.
 
hitmen19 said:
so dumb if you think ovechkin doesn't make the team better. he would have to buy into the shorter shifts aspect
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Being coached by someone with a clue for change wouldn't hurt either.

You don't think team Canada could have used a pure sniper, really?
 
Canada's great defensive play wouldn't just evaporate due to Ovechkin being on the team. Canada could have used more finishing, which Ovechkin is an all time great at. He easily makes the team better.
 
I think better. But I don't think Babcock would hesitate to bench him if he wasn't backchecking.
 
HabFanInLeafLand said:
Why would they need a guy with 40 goals in 55 games?
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With all those goals he's still a -17. That is unbelievable.

He would have been a great asset to the power play but without significant changes to a structured system I think it is a legitimate question as to whether he would have helped the team outside of a pp specialist role.

By all means, if Ovechkin buys into a 200 foot, puck possession game with 40 second shifts and is capable of consistently winning board battles, he helps Canada. Any time he's been asked to perform this way he has been non-compliant and/or ineffective.
 
Could he swallow his obvious ego? Can he keep his shifts short? Can he follow a game plan?

I don't know. The way he played on Team Russia? No.
 
Interesting question. Wish there was a neutral option in the poll. The team won gold, so despite the early concerns about that offense, in the end it wasn't really a problem. He would have improved the offense, sure, but a slightly higher goal total isn't necessarily what makes a better team, is it?

I don't think the team would be worse defensively, but I do think the concern about "fit" is a valid enough one. By the end of the tournament, that system was a well-oiled machine. Truly dominated in terms of puck possession. I don't think Ovechkin would disrupt the balance and cause them to be porous defensively, but maybe he might not have been the best option from a system perspective.

It goes without saying he'd be one of the most talented players on the team, and he'd certainly have a gold medal if he was on the team.
 
Dumb question. Absolutely. An elite goal scorer, and you can trust he'd have a coaching staff utilize him properly on Team Canada.

You can damn well bet his reputation would be better if he was Canadian, too.
 
I think he would do just fine. His peers and coaching would force him to play the system and his size, speed and skill will carry him the rest of the way. I'd liken him to Corey Perry or Jeff Carter.
 
I wouldn't be too sure about him making the team better, that depends so much on how well he buys into their system, how well he gells with his line mates and so on, but I am completely certain that he wouldn't make the team worse.

Pretty much no risk high reward to inject him in the lineup. If he fails? Bench him. If he succeeds? You're better.
 
Ovechkin's lethality on the PP more than makes up for the marginal (if any) decrease in D you'd have from replacing, say, Rick Nash. As long as he's not floating on the red line, one winger can't hurt the system that much. Limit his ES minutes and put him out in the PP and Canada scores more and MAYBE allows one additional goal somewhere, at worst
 
Yes, even if he's a defensive liability, you could just hold him as a PP guy, which is better than what TC PP's did....
 
revolverjgw said:
Ovechkin's lethality on the PP more than makes up for the marginal (if any) decrease in D you'd have from replacing, say, Rick Nash. As long as he's not floating on the red line, one winger can't hurt the system that much. Limit his ES minutes and put him out in the PP and Canada scores more and MAYBE allows one additional goal somewhere, at worst
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Rick Nash played extremely well defensively and he had his offensive moments. I would never trade him for OV. Patrick Sharp on though was the most disappointing Canadian player IMO and I wouldn't mind having OV instead of him.
 
Ovechkin can do anything a coach wants. He can hit, back-check, pass, shoot, whatever. He's a half decent hockey player. You need the right coach though. He would have given everything for Russia, but they had a bad coach and defense.
 
Better. It's not like Ovechkin would make everyone at the team horrible on defense, plus we would've had a lot more goals if he was being set up by Crosby.
 
Not many, if any, better players if you are behind a goal late in the game...so in this particular situation where that never happened the answer is no.

Stamkos would have been an asset in any case.
 
I hate the 'buys into the system' talk. Of course he would. He let the Russian coach mis-utilize him all tournament. Wrong wing, wrong spot on the powerplay, etc, etc. He'll do whatever the team wants him to.
 
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Kranix said:
Ovechkin can do anything a coach wants. He can hit, back-check, pass, shoot, whatever. He's a half decent hockey player. You need the right coach though. He would have given everything for Russia, but they had a bad coach and defense.
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:shakehead
 
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