2015 World Junior Championship

[Jasmine]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

That is awesome! ^^ Go Canada!!!

[Josh]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Scored platinum tickets to the gold medal game :) Canada better be in that game :D

Wow, that's awesome!

[Jasmine]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Game 1 is in the books - Final score 8-0 against Slovakia

[Josh]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Nick Paul scored a goal :)

[matchesmalone]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Nick Paul had a strong game. Was kinda cool that he and Lazar were killing penalties together.

I think that "top" line needs another more skilled guy, like Petan. Right now they have Ritchie there. Ritchie and Lazar, while great junior players, with probably long NHL careers ahead of them, neither is particularly creative with the puck. I think Lazar will stay on the line, since he seems to be playing a kind of mentor role with McDavid. McDavid and Petan's play-making abilities together would create a lot of scoring chances for Lazar. Plus all three have great speed.

How good was Eichel though? Wow... Austin Matthews wasn't as impressive as I'd expected him to be, but I guess Eichel set the bar pretty high last year. And I thought Demko looked strong in net. USA is a wildcard in this tournament for me. With Larkin, Tuch, Milano, De Leo, Werenski, Hanifin, DeAngelo, they are so ridiculously talented, but so very young.

But I think the most impressive player from all the games today was Nik Ehlers. He looked like Ilya Kovalchuk with the puck on his stick. Doesn't have a shot like Kovalchuk, but that powerplay goal was impressive none the less.

[Dean Ambrose]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

I feel like the Canadian media and fans have greatly exaggerated the gap between McDavid-Eichel.

[Josh]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Matches had made a post about that recently. He said they were much closer than people realized. I however still think that McDavid will be shown to be far and away the better player.

[Sara]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Sold my tickets on stubhub and traded them in for reds instead. Looking for tickets to the Bronze medal game now! :) Can't wait!

[matchesmalone]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Nik Ehlers and Oliver Bjorkstrand played really well again today, despite Denmark being overwhelmed by Sweden. At least Denmark had one line that could match any line Sweden could roll out. Christoffer Ehn for Sweden looked really impressive in the offensive zone with his combination of size and stickhandling abilities. Detroit might have found another one with a fourth round pick in 2014.

Lazar and McDavid were clicking today for Canada. So it may have been against weak opponents, but that means all four of Canada's lines have had productive outings in the first two games. The biggest issue for Canada today was discipline. If they take dumb penalties like that against USA or Sweden they are gonna get torched.

The highlight of today for me was Kevin Fiala. Little dude with incredible skill, creativity, and offensive awareness, and at times he won battles on the boards against multiple larger opponents. He could be a star in the NHL, or at least a top six forward.

[Dean Ambrose]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

[matchesmalone]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Nick Paul...

Too bad they don't have Vollman charts/numbers for this tournament. I'm wondering how sheltered Point and Virtanen are. Also, from what I've noticed watching the games, the Reinhart line tends to get a large portion of the defensive zone starts. Not sure about line matchups though, since I didn't know enough about Germany or Slovakia to really know who their top players were.

Fiala not quite so dominant today. He did create a number of chances, and was one of the only Swiss players doing so, but had trouble winning as many board battles against the larger Russian opponents. Still had to applaud the tenacity.

Eichel and DeAngelo had strong games again today. USA's other under-agers, Hanifin, Matthews and Werenski all had stronger games after failing to impress much on Boxing Day. Detroit first rounder Dylan Larkin and Chicago first rounder Nick Schmaltz were the standouts today for me though.

Although San Jose first rounder Nikolai Goldobin was also very dangerous, again.

[Alfie11]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

We arrived in Montreal a little into the States vs Finland game but still saw most of it. Our seats are pretty awesome. Let me know if you can see me on TV at all :lol: I'm wearing a home Sens jersey with Lazar on the back. I'm a few rows back from the ice, a little off from the middle. The girl I'm with is wearing an away Canada jersey from this year.

We've done every game in Montreal so far. Tonight should be a bit of a test for Canada and Fucale. I haven't felt 100% comfortable with him in nets, maybe that's just me. Hopefully he has a strong game tonight and stands out as the starter. I think Lazar looks good out there. He looked a little nervous and u confident with handling the puck, but I noticed later in the Germany game he looked great and him and McDavid started forming some chemistry. The Domi line has been the best so far. Also, I feel bad for Virtanen because his line mates have been the worst forwards for us, IMO. He's been impressive, though. Ritchie is someone that i want to see a little more from...he's not creating space for McDavid and Lazar. Paul has been impressive this tournament.

Eichel looks really good. It's hard to compare him to McDavid because of the rust, but you can see the talent in both of them. Also, that Slovakia upset over Finland was crazy. Losing 8-0 then turning around the next day and beating the Gold medal champs? Impressive.

Looking forward to the next two games for Canada. Not sure yet what we're doing for New Years Eve yet, and I'd ask for input on here but I don't think I'll be on until after. Montreal is my favourite city in Canada, though. Really not looking forward to when the tournament moves to Toronto, but I'm getting off track here :lol:

[Jasmine]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Looking up the schedule, I was surprised that the Canada/USA game is at 4pm. Oh well, the New Year's eve party will start early! :D

[Dean Ambrose]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

They really overpriced the games in Montreal. It's a joke.

[Sara]

Re: 2015 World Junior Championship

Not really. I was looking on stubhub earlier and the prices to the Canada games are pretty reasonable. Obviously you're going to pay more than face value on sites like that, but from what I saw it wasn't outrageous.