Just one full practice for Team Canada in preparation for their Saturday night showdown with USA in what will surely be a highly charged atmosphere at Montreal’s Bell Centre.
By all accounts it was an extremely fast-paced session, in keeping with the fast-paced game the Canadian squad delivered against Sweden in the tournament opener, in which they squeaked out a 4-3 overtime win. USA followed up with a 6-1 win over Finland on Thursday, meaning first place in the round robin and a likely berth in the tournament final will be on the line when the two fierce rivals meet up on Saturday.
Canadian coach Jon Cooper changed things up on the blueline by necessity, and in his forward lines by choice. On the back end, Travis Sanheim will draw into the line-up in place of Shea Theodore, who suffered an injury on Wednesday that has knocked him out of the tournament and will sideline him on a week-to-week basis going forward.
Up front, Cooper left his top six intact but shuffled up the bottom two lines. Sam Bennett will see his first action centring a take-no-prisoners fourth line between Brad Marchand and Seth Jarvis. Travis Konecny will draw the short straw; on Friday he was a placeholder on defence when Cale Makar missed the practice due to illness. One of the challenges of having such short rosters for this one-off tourney.
Meanwhile, Cooper has united the three forwards from his own Tampa Bay Lightning, as Brandon Hagel and Brayden Point will flank Anthony Cirelli. No worries about chemistry on that trio.
The lone Edmonton Oiler to make the team, Connor McDavid, will continue to play between a pair of ace attackers in Florida’s Sam Reinhart and Toronto’s Mitch Marner. McDavid had an effective first game, buzzing around the offensive zone on the forecheck and taking the puck hard to the net a couple of times. But the line as a whole didn’t really click. McDavid did earn an assist on Canada’s lone powerplay opportunity, while Marner of course scored the game winner in overtime playing with other mates.
There are no magic answers to be found in the chemistry lab. McDavid has very little experience playing with any other player on the team, nor they with him. Not only are there no Edmonton teammates such as Evan Bouchard or Zach Hyman on the Canadian squad, there aren’t even any former Oilers. Meaning what little time McD has played with any teammate came in international settings (much) earlier in his career.
McDavid’s player page from Elite Prospects tells the tale. Here’s his full record since 2012, the year he was drafted by Erie Otters at age 15 under the OHL’s Exceptional Player rule. Of interest here are his various ventures into international play, appropriately shown in red font.
The record shows McDavid repped his country — or at least his continent — at least once per season from 2012-18. Since then, nothing at all until the very bottom line representing the current tourney. No Olympics because the NHL twice pulled back from participating. No World Cup because… reasons. No World Championships because the Oilers have been in the playoffs every year.
Here is the sum total of McDavid’s prior experiences playing with current teammates:
- 2012-13 U-17: Sam Bennett, 5 games
- 2012-13 U-18: Bennett, Sam Reinhart, Josh Morrissey, Shea Theodore, each 7 games
- 2013-14 WJC: Reinhart, Morrissey, each 7 games
- 2014-15 WJC: Reinhart, Morrissey, Theodore, Brayden Point, each 7 games
- 2015-16 IIHF Worlds: Reinhart, Mark Stone, Brad Marchand, each 10 games
- 2016-17 World Cup: Nathan MacKinnon, Colton Parayko, each 3 games
- 2017-18 IIHF Worlds: Parayko, 10 games
His current linemate Reinhart is somewhat familiar, having played 4 tournaments totalling 31 games on the same team, though not often the same line. Alas the most recent of those experiences was 9 years ago when both were NHL rookies.
His next most familiar teammate is Morrissey, with whom he played 3 straight tourneys (21 GP) at the junior level when both were teenagers. The most recent of those was a full decade ago.
Since McDavid turned pro, he twice played on the same team as Parayko. One of those events — McDavid’s only prior best-on-best experience with a hodgepodge crew called Team North America Young Stars — was just 3 games.
All of which means that any chemistry with his temporary teammates will need to be forged on the fly. That may prove to be a tougher task for them than it is for him, given Connor is plenty used to playing with teammates who are slower than him, whereas few of them regularly play with such a highly-evolved skater. The key is for his new mates, be they on the wings or the blueline, to find ways to get #97 the puck in space so he can use that blinding speed and consummate skill to full advantage, then to get open for the return pass without getting boxed out. Didn’t see a lot of that in Game One. At times I got the impression they didn’t even know where to find him.
Lines that don’t instantly click is a common problem for Team Canada at almost any tournament. This one, however, is so short that there’s precious little time to build that chemistry.
The good news from all of it, however, is that the current experience should prove useful indeed just one year from now. That’s when the NHL returns to the Olympics for the first time in McDavid’s career. There will be plenty of overlap between the two rosters, and their prior experience together will be relatively recent rather than in the distant past. From a hockey perspective, the most important function of the one-off 4 Nations Face-Off may well prove to be team-building in preparation for next year’s much bigger prize.
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