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Another IIHF World Juniors Championship has come and gone for Canada, and the team will be going home empty-handed once again.
Team Canada fell to Czechia 4-3 in Thursday’s quarterfinal for the second straight year.
For many fans, it left a sour taste in their mouth.
TSN’s AJ Jakubec joined The Green Zone Show to go over what went wrong for the Canadians.
“There’s problems in terms of the lineup, problems in terms of roster selection,” he said. “I’m a huge Dave Cameron guy, I think he’s a good head coach. He did not have a good tournament, there’s no sugarcoating that.”
Canada never seemed to be able to fully click and once it appeared like they turned a page, Jakubec said something else would stop them.
“They never seemed to get on track, and when they did they were derailed by penalty problems,” he said. “Whether they were deserved or not, most of them throughout the tournament were.”
Read more:
- Canada takes down Germany at World Juniors
- Canada wins Boxing Day Game 1 of IIHF World Juniors against Finland 4-0
- World Juniors whammy: Canada upset by Latvia in shootout
As for the blame, Jakubec said it can’t all fall onto management.
“There’s 10 first-round picks on this team and I think some of them did not play to expectation,” Jakubec said. “You can blame the coaches for that, but in the end that ultimately falls on those players.
“There is no doubt the coaching staff bears some of the blame whether its decisions or roster moves.”
Jakubec believes Hockey Canada’s biggest hurdle is their roster selection process.
“I feel like they just over-thought it,” he said. “You think about 25 first-round picks and that’s not even including Macklin Celebrini and Connor Bedard, who are of course unavailable to them.”
For many fans when the initial roster came out there was a list of names people were shocked didn’t make the roster, the name atop of most lists was Beckett Sennecke a forward with the Saginaw Spirit in the Ontario Hockey League.
The 18-year-old has 52 points in 31 games and wasn’t originally invited to the training camp but after a couple of injuries, Canada invited the Anaheim Ducks prospect.
Jakubec said even he couldn’t believe Sennecke’s name wasn’t on the roster.
“He was one of Canada’s best players against the U-Sports team by a good margin,” he said. “My own two eyes saw he was one of the best players at camp and they (Hockey Canada) blew it.”
Carter Yakemchuk a defenceman with the Calgary Hitmen not being selected was another head-scratcher for Jakubec as he was described as a top-six defenceman with the Ottawa Senators during the team’s pre-season training camp.
