As I reported two days ago, the Canadian team officials for the Beijing Olympics have selected their skaters. As you may have noticed, young defenseman Kaiden Guhle was not on the list of participants for the competition.
That question was answered by Team Canada's Director of Player Personnel, Blair MacKasey. According to him, apart from the selection of the young Owen Power, he was anxious to have an unexperienced defenseman.
Guhle is a mature young man, but it is very rare that players of this age are selected by the Canadian team. Owen Power and Mason McTavish are the exceptions to the rule, certainly, if NHL players were there, we wouldn't even be talking about them.
As for veterans Eric Staal and David Desharnais, they will be able to greatly benefit from the size of the rinks, as they will be the same size as in the NHL.
