Canadiens World Junior History103 Players And Counting

The World Junior Hockey Championships were held for the first time in 1974. Doug Jarvis, undrafted and representing the Peterborough Petes was the first (future) Canadien to play in the tournament. Though the tournament had humble beginnings, it soon became a barometer for young talent, especially following the Gretzky tournament of 1978. The Canadiens scouts over the years have clearly used the tournament to make their minds up, which is either very efficient or very lazy (I can't quite decide yet). And since Jarvis there have been 102 other World Junior alum to suit up for the big club in Montreal, including a whopping 50 for team Canada.

On the eve of the big climax to the junior tournament, I thought you might all enjoy a look at Habs to participate in this tournament over the years.

Of the current Habs (coaches included), there are only a handful of players who never suited up for their country at this event – 10 in all. The list is headed by Guy Carbonneau, who probably would have made the cut in 1978 were it not for some political in-fighting and no Quebec presence on the Gretzky edition of the team (Ray Bourque and Michel Goulet were also overlooked). Robert Lang also missed out, probably because he was a late bloomer if his patchy stats from Czechoslovakia from that time are to be believed. The others are less surprising with Lapierrs, Kostopoulos, Dandenault, Laraque, D'Agostini, Gorges, Bouillon and O'Byrne all missing out on their opportunities.

Team Canada
Steve Begin, Patrice Brisebois, Andrew Cassels, Kyle Chipchura, Eric Chouinard, Shayne Corson, Alain Cote, Russ Courtnall, JJ Daigneault, Jason Dawe, Marc Denis, Eric Desjardins, Gerald Diduck, Karl Dykhuis, Stephane Fiset, Doug Gilmour, Jeff Hackett, Kevin Haller, Doug Jarvis, Yvan Joly, Mike Keane, Guillaume Latendresse, Gary Leeman, Claude Lemieux, Trevor Linden, Rollie Melanson, Olivier Michaud, Kirk Muller, Garth Murray, Dave Orleski, Patrick Poulin, Carey Price, Yves Racine, Rob Ramage, Mark Recchi, Mike Riberio, Stephane Richer, Michael Ryder, Pierre Sevigny, Richard Sevigny, Bobby Smith, Doug Soetaert, Alex Tanguay, Jose Theodore, Scott Thornton, Darcy Tucker, Pierre Turgeon, Sylvain Turgeon, Ryan Walter, Jason Ward

USSR/CIS/Russia
Sergei Berezin, Valeri Bure, Andrei Kovalenko, Alexei Kovalev, Vladimir Malakhov, Andrei Markov, Alexander Perezhogin, Oleg Petrov, Sergei Samsonov, Sergei Zholtok

Sweden
Patrik Carnback, Kjell Dahlin, Jonas Hoglund, Patrik Kjellberg, Mats Naslund, Niklas Sundstrom

Czechoslovakia/Czech and Slovakia
Jozef Balej, Jaroslav Halak, Roman Hamrlik, Marcel Hossa, Tomas Plekanec, Martin Rucinsky, Petr Svoboda, Tomas Vokoun, Richard Zednik

Finland
Marti Jarventie, Marko Kiprusoff, Saku Koivu, Juha Lind, Jyrki Lumme

USA
Jim Campbell, Chris Chelios, Tom Chorske, Ron Hainsey, Chris Higgins, Sean Hill, Pat Jablonski, Mike Komisarek, Tom Kurvers, Scott Lachance, John Leclair, Craig Ludwig, Max Pacioretty, Matt Schneider, Bryan Smolinski, Alfue Turcotte, Eric Weinrich, David Wilkie

Switzerland
David Aebischer, Mark Streit

Poland
Mariusz Czerkawski

Belarus
Andrei Kostitsyn, Sergei Kostitsyn (Grabovski only ever played in the B-tier competition)


Top player at position honours
Best forward – Niklas Sundstrom
Best goalie – Stephane Fiset, Jose Theodore, Marc Denis, David Aebischer, Carey Price

Tournament All-star team
Forward – Mats Naslund, Shayne Corson, Alexei Kovalev, Martin Rucinsky, Valeri Bure, Niklas Sundstrom, Sergei Samsonov
Defence – Scott Lachance, Andrei Markov, Mark Streit
Goalie – Stephane Fiset, David Aebischer, Carey Price


Top 10 Games played
21 – Niklas Sundstrom
15 – Scott Lachance
14 – Shayne Corson, Patrice Brisebois, Chris Higgins, Saku Koivu, Mike Komisarek, Tomas Plekanec, Eric Desjardins, Karl Dykhuis, Gary Leeman, Jason Ward, Jim Campbell, Kjell Dahlin, Ron Hainsey, Marcel Hossa, John Leclair, Eric Weinrich, Sergei Zholtok


Top 10 Points
33 – Niklas Sundsrom
19 – Shayne Corson
18 – Saku Koivu
16 – John Leclair
15 – Mats Naslund
14 – Martin Rucinsky
13 – Jim Campbell, Kjell Dahlin, Sergei Samsonov, Russ Courtnall

Top 10 Points per game
2.00 – Martin Rucinsky
1.86 – Russ Courtnall
1.67 – Bobby Smith
1.57 – Niklas Sundstrom, Andrei Kovalenko, Alfie Turcotte
1.43 – Alexei Kovalev
1.36 – Shayne Corson
1.33 – Ryan Walter
1.29 – Saku Koivu

Top 10 Goals
18 – Niklas Sundstrom
10 – John Leclair, Sergei Samsonov
9 – Shayne Corson, Martin Rucinsky
8 – Kjell Dahlin
7 – Jim Campbell, Russ Courtnall, Chris Higgins
5 – Mats Naslund, Andrei Kovalenko, Alexei Kovalev, Valeri Bure, Ryan Walter, Juha Lind, Richard Zednik, Yvan Joly

Top 10 Goals per game
1.29 – Martin Rucinsky
1.00 – Russ Courtnall
0.86 – Niklas Sundstrom
0.83 – Ryan Walter, Richard Zednik
0.80 – Doug Jarvis
0.77 – Sergei Samsonov
0.71 – John Leclair, Andrei Kovalenko, Alexei Kovalev, Valeri Bure, Juha Lind

Top 10 Points (Defenceman)
11 – Patrice Brisebois
8 – Scott Lachance
7 – Ron Hainsey
6 – Andrei Markov, Tom Kurvers
5 – David Wilkie, Eric Desjardins, Rob Ramage, Alain Cote, Jyrki Lumme
4 – Kevin Haller, Marko Kiprusoff, Petr Svoboda

Top 10 Points per game (Defenceman)
0.86 – Tom Kurvers
0.79 – Patrice Brisebois
0.71 – Alain Cote, Jyrki Lumme
0.57 – Kevin Haller, Marko Kiprusoff, Petr Svoboda
0.53 – Scott Lachance
0.50 – Ron Hainsey
0.46 – Andrei Markov


Finally, for a bit of fun to wrap up the post, I thought a Canadiens all-time WJC participant roster based on WJC performance (including personal stats and medal standings), interesting considering the current Habs featuring:

Forward lines:
Mats Naslund – Saku Koivu – Niklas Sundstrom
Martin Rucinsky – Shayne Corson – Alexei Kovalev
John Leclair – Ryan Walter – Andrei Kovalenko
Sergei Samsonov – Doug Jarvis – Russ Courtnall

Defence pairings
Patrice Brisebois – Andrei Markov
Scott Lachance – Eric Desjardins
Mark Streit – Rob Ramage

Goalies
Carey Price
David Aebischer

Halak of respect?

Apart form the growing buzz of Habs fans singing Price, Price, Price, all of the newspapers and Habs blogs these days are talking up the former first rounder. One of, if not my favourite, Habs blog (eyesontheprize) guarantees, with a bit of bravado, that Carey Price will start the season in Montreal. Why? Well the Calder Cup run proved he has nothing to learn in the AHL of course.



I was as thrilled as anyone when the Bulldogs won the Calder Cup, but the resulting hype surrounding Carey Price has been ridiculous. The guy won the Calder Cup and the playoff MVP with his stellar play. All this in addition to his eye-catching play at the 2006 WJC.

Both fine achievements. No doubt.

Before we hand Carey the keys to the Bell Centre, maybe it’s worth considering what he did the other 80 games of his season (and prior to last year)– the ones with his team, the Tri-city Americans:

1) Carey Price compiled decent stats with 2.45 GAA (7th) and .917 S% (3rd), the two players that beat him out in save % – Leland Irving in both categories (1.86, .929), Taylor Dakers (2.16, .919) – show that he probably wasn’t the top goalie over the WHL season. Tyson Sexsmith, who beat Carey in GAA (with 1.79) also won the Memorial Cup with his Vancouver Giants.

It’s worth noting that none of the three is slated to play in the NHL for certain this year.

2) Carey’s heroics didn’t pay off for his team last season. They finished 4th in the league, but were eliminated in the first round of the WHL playoffs. Carey Price did best again in save %, good enough for 7th in the WHL playoffs. Both Dakers and Sexsmith bested him again

3) His stats from the year before suggest that he was never the top WHL goalie (2.87 GAA and .906 save %), which made him look like an average to below average WHL goalie. And another first round elimination with a sub-900 save % in the playoffs, didn’t exactly point to big-game pedigree at the time.

What these stats show me is that Carey is very much a can-miss prospect. Let’s face it Team Canada goalies always look good. I mean we don’t think Pogge will be a star do we? And the Hamilton Cup run shows real improvement from Carey, especially following the disappointing elimination of his own team (which consequently freed him up to play for the Bulldogs).

The foolhardiness of proclaiming him an NHLer already belies a skewed perspective, one with blinders to the majority of his form last year.

It also belittles the accomplishments of our other prospect goalie: Jaroslav Halak. He who led the AHL in most statistics for the entire season. He who faced NHL shooters and won his games under pressure. And were it not for a hugely complimentary call-up to his country’s senior national team, he may have taken his NHL-enhanced confidence to the Calder Cup as well. Halak, who was purported in the same article, to have a lot left to learn in the AHL, actually has a claim to having done all he can down there as well in my eyes – perhaps even a better one than Carey Price.



Don't get me wrong though. I very much support the idea of Carey Price in Montreal, even to start. But I would like him to earn that job. I think Gainey is probably on the same page as me here. In fact, I'll make a guarantee of my own:

Carey Price will not start the season in Montreal if Halak and Huet outplay him in training camp.

It would not be a waste for him to play in Hamilton by any means as suggested by eyesontheprize, simply because he could benefit from learning how to put together 60 games in a season. Even Carey Price knows that, he's said as much on more than one occasion.

Why Gainey should be open to trading Carey Price

These being the dog days of summer (if you can call this weather over here summer), I have been spending more time reading blogs and discussion forums looking for Habs news. As I did, I noticed a couple of recurring themes:

1) Habs fans desperately want to trade for someone they can talk about (it would help if the player was also good as well as interesting or controversial); and

2) Habs fans are not willing to give up their prized assets (mostly Price, Higgins and Komisarek)


Like other fans, I too long for a player that would really become a star in Montreal. I'm not sure if Marleau could be, but maybe Lecavalier or Hossa could be. Who knows. Obviously speculating is 80% of the fun. However, I'm also not under the illusion that trading a combination of Dandenault, Bouillon, Ryder, Plekanec and Halak will fetch us anyone of the calibre we are looking for.

That is why I am beginning to think if our real desire is a star, one like Lecavalier (I'd like Iginla), then we have to bite the bullet and give up something another team actually wants or needs. So, below I present to you my rationale for trading Carey Price:


1) His value as of this moment is very high. You can argue that it might go higher, but you can not argue with the fact that he is currently looking the best he did since being drafted. If a GM rates him as highly as Habs fans, we should find himand make a trade with him. If we can get franchise player return (in the form of established star or stars) for him as a potential franchise player, then we're just as well off.

This point really encompasses all the others, and is the most important.



2) World Juniors success should not be extrapolated to NHL success. First of all, the WJC is 6 games long. Carey Price won 6 games! But, don't forget he won them playing for Canada, not Slovakia, not Germany, not Ukraine. Canada beat Sweden (2-0), USA (6-3), Germany (3-1), Slovakia (3-0), USA again (2-1 in SO), and Russia (4-2).

It's not unipressive, but consider Russia beat Czech Republic (3-2), Switzerland (6-0), Belarus (6-1), Finland (5-0) and Sweden (4-2) before losing to Canada.

So in those five games before the final Carey Price let in 5 goals with 2 shutouts, whereas the Russian goalie let in 5 goals with 2 shutouts. But who's talking about Semen Varlamov?

Canada has won the WJC 12 other times in the past 25 years. A look at the winning goalies shows that WJC success doesn't mean NHL superstardom (although Theodore was the exception for about 6 years):

1982 – Mike Moffat (3-0-1, 1.75, 1 SO)
1985 – Craig Billington (3-0-2, 2.60, 1 SO)
1988 – Jimmy Waite (6-0-1, 2.29, 0 SO)
1990 – Stephane Fiset (5-1-1, 2.57, 0 SO)
1992 – Trevor Kidd (4-1-1, 2.25, 1 SO)
1993 – Manny Legace (6-0-0, 1.67, 1 SO)
1994 – Manny Fernandez (3-0-0, 3.33, 0 SO)
1995 – Dan Cloutier (3-0-0, 2.67, 0 SO)
1996 – Jose Theodore (4-0-0, 1.50, 0 SO)
1997 – Marc Denis (5-0-2, 1.86, 1 SO)
2005 – Jeff Glass (5-0-0, 1.40, 1 SO)
2006 – Justin Pogge (6-0-0, 1.00, 3 SO)



3) The Calder Cup while being a great achievement is not the barometer for great NHL goalies either. Facing AHL players is not the same as facing NHLers. Incidentally, the last 6 Butterfield trophy (Calder Cup MVP) winners have been goalies. Once again, the list doesn't exactly inspire, though they are a nice list of prospects: Pasi Nurminen, Johan Holmqvist, Wade Flaherty, Antero Nittymaki, Frederic Cassivi and Carey Price.

Even with all the talk about Price's achievements mirroring Roy's, it's interesting to note, Roy did not win that trophy – good ole Brian Skrudland did.


4) The age of goaltending might have passed.

In the 1990s and before the lockout, a lot of Stanley Cups went to the team with the best goalie: 1993 Roy, 1995 Brodeur, 1996 Roy, 1999 Belfour (nearly Hasek), 2000 Brodeur, 2001 Roy, 2002 Hasek, 2003 Brodeur.

The last couple of years have made forwards look useful again. Buffalo and Ottawa are thriving, and no one would argue Emery or Miller fit in the Roy and Brodeur's category. Edmonton made the final with a half decent goalie, so did Carolina. Giguere is good, obviously, but watching Anaheim made the fact that Pronger and Niedermayr being there help a lot.

Obviously if Carey Price is another Roy, Brodeur or Hasek, we'd still be in business. But, at this point that's all still speculation.

5) He's deemed untouchable. Letting a GM finangle him out of Gainey in a trade makes other GM feel great. He got an untouchable out of Montreal. Said GM, will probably pay more for the trouble as well – you only have to look at Kevin Lowe to see how some GMs overrate potential.



Trades are all about timing.

One day, Carey price gets you Vincent Lecavalier.

A bad training camp later, he'll fetch Milan Hejduk.

And, heaven forbid, a whole bad season, we're trading for a draft pick.

Take the example of Jose Theodore. Back in 2002, with goalie prospect Garon in the pipeline, I thought: Theodore for Iginla, how about it? Hart trophy winner for Hart trophy runner-up, Vezina trophy winner for Art Ross. I guess Calgary might not have gone for it, nor Montreal for that matter. But it didn't look crazy at the time. A few years later, you have to pay with draft picks to get someone to take Theodore of your hands.

We had the same opportunity with Ribeiro, who I thought topped out with 60 odd points. We traded him after a bad season instead.


Now, please don't get me wrong. I think Carey price looks pretty sure fire. I was as pleased as anyone about him winning the WJC and Calder Cup. But, one of the reasons I was pleased is that his value grew immensely. After a mediocre and a decent junior season, his value needed the boost.

I'd also be happy if we kept him. However, if the right offer comes up, I think Bob Gainey should listen and, indeed, take it. There's no room for being sentimental on a 10th place team. Sentimentality is for dynasties. The same thoughts of course apply for both Higgins and Komisarek. If someone sees more value in them than Gainey does, he should deal up. The one thing I do dread is trading one of these people for someone who is also overrated, what we need to get back is a known quantity, a star. Not a bigger gamble.

The possibility of trading a future goaltending great might be a dilemma, but it is a nice dilemma to have after the cupboard has been so bare the past few years.