When Dean Lombardi put together the US roster for the return of the World Cup of Hockey, one model that attracted his attention was a team from 20 years ago.
That US team led by Brett Hull, Brian Leetch, Mike Modano and Mike Richter beat Canada to win the tournament, a title the general manager of the Los Angeles Kings hopes to duplicate this fall. Lombardi and USA Hockey finalized the 23-man roster on Friday last week, and the result is a gritty bunch that fit coach John Tortorella’s personality.
Instead of taking pure skill in the form of forwards Phil Kessel and Paul Stastny, and defensemen Cam Fowler and Kevin Shattenkirk, the US went with grinders Ryan Callahan and Brandon Dubinsky up front and two-way players Jack Johnson and Erik Johnson on the blue line.
Photo: AP
Lombardi said the goal was the “type of the team that you think can beat Canada,” and one that will coalesce quickly without much time to prepare.
“It made it essential that you do all your research in terms of not only the quality of the player and his ability, but their history of being a good teammate and things like that,” Lombardi said on Tuesday in a telephone interview. “There was a lot to choose from, do not forget. There are a lot of good players and you could easily argue that this guy should be here and everything else, and you would not be wrong.”
The 1996 team had high-end skill in the form of Hull, Modano, Jeremy Roenick and Tony Amonte, who scored the World Cup-winning goal that Lombardi considers the biggest in US hockey history — more significant than Mike Eruzione’s from the “Miracle on Ice” against the then-Soviet Union at the 1980 Olympics.
Photo: AP
Lombardi was quick to point to the Chicago Blackhawks’ Patrick Kane, Minnesota Wild’s Zach Parise and San Jose Sharks’ Joe Pavelski as the offensive talent that should mesh with the toughness of Dubinsky, Callahan, St Louis Blues captain David Backes and Anaheim Ducks center Ryan Kesler.
No Kessel came as a surprise given that he tied for the scoring lead at the 2014 Sochi Olympics and is leading the Pittsburgh Penguins in points in the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs. Lombardi said the US has plenty of skilled wingers and he was looking to fill specific roles with its final few players.
“He is a top player, but so are these other guys,” Lombardi said of Kessel. “It is a good problem to have, but you cannot have all skill, just like you cannot have all grit.”
Lombardi and fellow USA Hockey management members Paul Holmgren and Brian Burke like a certain amount of size and toughness on their teams. Hiring Tortorella cemented that, and the final roster meetings in Colorado included a lot of the coach’s input.
However, Lombardi also talked to 1996 World Cup-winning players like Keith Tkachuk, Bill Guerin and Derian Hatcher as well as some who got a silver medal at the 2010 Olympics and lost the bronze-medal game in Sochi. He wanted to know what went right, what went wrong and how to fix it, going so far as to watch the 1996 tournament again in the process.
That group was together in dorm rooms for a month in Providence, Rhode Island. This year’s team is to have some time at a training camp in Columbus, Ohio, but it is so little preparation that Lombardi and company wanted to define jobs in advance.
“If you are going to pull it together quickly, it is very clear what your roles are,” Lombardi said. “You do not have time for players to figure that out. That is what a player wants. He wants to know his role, then he will fit into your team concept.”
With a focus on NHL-sized ice and Canada as the target, Lombardi hopes he has put together the right mix to win it all in Toronto.
Canada is “the benchmark and that is what you have got to look at if you are going to win this thing,” Lombardi said. “If they can come together like [the 1996] group and learn from maybe some of the mistakes they made as a group in the past, and a lot of them have been together, they can beat Canada. No doubt about it.”
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