Introducing The Future Gold Medalists On USA 2021 World Juniors Roster
In 1980 Herb Brooks set out to assemble a Team USA which wasn't necessarily rostered with the best players, but he was searching for the right ones. The perfect combination of skill, heart, balls, determination, and character to go up against the world's best and come out on top. Sometimes when you assemble an all-star team, you run into the age old issue of having too many cooks in the kitchen. People forget that there's only one puck out there on the ice at a time.
So does this USA roster jump out at you and immediately make the Canadians shit their pants? Is Mother Russia going to look at this roster and already start trying to cancel the Christmas Day Showdown? Perhaps not. But just like Gordon Bombay said at the Junior Goodwill Games, we're Team USA and we're going all the way.
Now I'm not going to do any full in-depth previews for the tournament just yet. That'll be coming later next week into the week leading up to the tournament. But USA Hockey released their final roster for the 2021 World Juniors this morning and I'd be remiss if we didn't at least talk about some of the highlights here. Let's start with the forwards.
FORWARDS
Here's where you'll see the majority of the names that you're familiar with from previous tournaments. The Americans have 5 players returning from last year's team that ended up getting bounced in the quarterfinals and finishing in 6th place. In alphabetical order you've got Bobby Brink ('19, PHI 2nd), Cole Caufield ('19, MTL 1st), Arthur Kaliyev ('19, LAK 2nd), Alex Turcotte ('19, LAK 1st), and Trevor Zegras ('19, ANA 1st).
Personally I think the most exciting player out of that group to watch is Cole Caufield, but that's just because I love the shit out of some goals. Also, he may be tiny but he is also fierce.
The only issue is that if he's not scoring, you're not going to really see much out of him during the tournament. He checked in with a goal and assist at last year's WJC. Pretty uneventful 5 games for him.
Trevor Zegras is the guy who was mostly making it happen for Team USA last year, but in the assist category. He finished 10th in the tournament in scoring with 9 points off of 9 assists. He was the only American in the top 10.
Obviously I'm a huge Bobby Brink fan because he's a Flyers prospect, but he'll probably be a big depth guy for this team again like he was last year. So the two players who I think you really need to count on would be the Kings prospects in Arthur Kaliyev and Alex Turcotte. Kaliyev was the top scoring right winger in the OHL last year with Hamilton. He had 4 goals in 5 games for USA at the World Juniors. This will be his 4th year coming up in the OHL so hopefully he's been acting as a spy for Team USA this whole time getting all the intel on Team Canada he can grab.
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Turcotte was the 5th overall pick in 2019. He was pretty quite in last year's tournament with 2 assists in 5 games. But he's a 5th overall pick center. There's plenty to work with there after having another year to get stronger.
The only '21 Draft Prospect on the team is Matthew Beniers, who currently has 3 goals and 3 assists in 8 games as a freshman at Michigan. He's projected to be a 1st rounder in 2021.
DEFENSE
There's only one player from last year's team returning to the blueline this year. That will be Cam York ('19, PHI 1st), who was taken in the draft just one spot ahead of Cole Caufield. He moves well, he can snap the puck, and oh yeah he's pretty jacked.
Aside from Yam Cork coming back, the biggest name to watch on the blueline will be Jake Sanderson ('20, OTT 1st). Now everything about Jake Sanderson screams "Ryan Whitney". He's an American defenseman with giant ears who was drafted 5th overall out of the US National Team Development Program. But let's hope the one thing that sets Jake Sanderson apart from the WhitDog is that Sanderson ends up winning a gold medal at the World Juniors instead of just having to talk about the Quebec PeeWee tournament all the time.
And finally we'll get between the pipes.
GOALIES
This will most likely be the biggest strength for the American team. USA will have 2 goalies making their return from last year's team. First up you have Spencer Knight ('19, FLA 1st), who was a member of that team that won a silver medal at the 2019 WJC. He didn't play in that tournament but a goalie making his 3rd trip back to the World Juniors is pretty solid.
He had a .931 SV% in 33 games last year for BC, and through 4 games this year he has 2 shutouts and a .955 SV%. He started in 4 games for Team USA at last year's tournament and went 2-2. Not terrible, but not incredible either. I'd expect him to still be the #1 this year.
Next up you have Dustin Wolf ('19, CAL 7th). He was drafted super super late in the 2019 draft but he ended up being the CHL Goaltender of the Year last year with the Everett Silvertips. Now you have to wonder if maybe Everett is just the best defensive team in the CHL since Carter Hart won the CHL goalie of the year there twice before. But Dustin Wolf had 9 shutouts in 46 games and a .935 SV%. He won the only game he played in for USA at last year's tournament, but gave up 3 goals.
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Either way, those are 2 quality goalies to head into this tournament with. Neither of them are going to be better than Yaroslav Askarov on Christmas Day for the Russians. But either of them could be good enough to at least keep it even in goal.
All in all I think the final number here is 9 First Round picks on this roster, and potentially 10 if you can Matthew Beniers in 2021. Not exactly a crazy number, especially when you look at Team Canada's roster and they only have 2 skaters who weren't drafted in the 1st round. But there's still enough to work here for Team USA to make this tournament nice and gritty. But yeah, definitely can't afford for any of the top end talent on this team to get sick. So make sure you wash your hands, boys. 20 seconds minimum.
USA Hockey is do or die.