Too Late For Love

So, what's up with USA hockey? What exactly is the selection process for choosing players to compete in the World Junior Championships? I imagine it's the same process they use to choose players for the Olympics and other tournaments. It's mostly politics. Remember a couple of years back when arguably the best American female to ever lace up skates for USA hockey, Cammi Granato was left off the Olympic team? That worked out pretty well now, didn't it? To refresh everyone's memory, the team failed to make the gold medal game and ended up winning bronze. Not to take away from that accomplishment, but most thought it was a huge disappointment at the time because the ladies usually challenged team Canada to be the best in the world. USA seems to be setting itself up for more criticism if they don't do well in this tournament.

Hurricanes third round draft pick, Drayson Bowman has literally torn up the WHL all season so far, but got zero love from the American selection committee. Apparently playing college hockey counts more to the committee or coaches, than averaging about a goal a game in Canadian junior hockey. Drayson had a great training camp here in Raleigh and went directly to Spokane, Washington and has played like a rising star. In 29 games so far, the kid has 26 goals and 21 assists for a total of 47 points. But he probably wasn't able to attend some USA hockey camp and that most likely eliminated him in the eyes of some coaches. It doesn't matter that he's been named player of the month in the WHL and player of the week for 2 consecutive weeks in the entire CHL, (all of Canadian Junior Hockey). That's not good enough for team USA? I see that 7 players were selected from the universities of Michigan and Minnesota alone. I'm sure they are all fine players, but they can't spread the wealth a bit and even things out around the country? It's also hard to believe that so many of the best players available, are in those 2 schools. USA hockey has a lot to improve upon, and how they select their teams should be on top of the list.

The Hurricanes have a a very informative report up concerning their WHL prospects which includes a question and answer session with Ron Francis.

Def Leppard