CALGARY — Even the world’s fastest player was caught off guard by the speed in which his contract status was brought up at Wednesday’s Team Canada press conference.
“Not even a softball Olympic question before we get started?” Deadpanned Connor McDavid, the Edmonton Oilers captain, as both Sidney Crosby and Sam Reinhart laughed beside him.
“I said at the end of June I have every intention just to take my time with it, and I feel the same way. Take my time and go through everything.
“I have every intention to win in Edmonton. That’s my only focus, maybe next to winning the gold with Canada.”
McDavid has one year left on a deal paying him $12.5 million U.S. annually, and both he and Oilers general manager Stan Bowman have expressed interest in getting an extension in place this summer.
Until then, it will continue to be the first topic of conversation surrounding the world’s best player.
Would he be okay opening the season without a deal in place?
“I’d say all options are on the table, really,” he said.
“We’re going through it. I don’t have a preference either way. I want the group to be as focused and dialled in and ready to roll come Day 1 as possible, and we don’t need any distractions.”
The only way to avoid that is by putting pen to paper well before opening puck drop.
Orientation time
McDavid’s comments came at a Calgary hotel, where 92 hopefuls for Canada’s Olympic men’s, women’s and para hockey teams are in the midst of a three-day gathering with three things in mind:
“Education, preparation and collaboration,” said Hockey Canada senior vice president, Scott Salmond, whose dream is to have all three programs win gold in Italy this February.
“We could have done three different orientations in three different places, but it was important to us as an organization to bring together all three programs to share and make sure we have the same vision.”
That vision is to win triple gold for the first time in Olympic hockey history.
Sid still the Man
The leadership and mystique surrounding Team Canada captain Sidney Crosby is a focal point of the camp.
Reinhart beamed when asked if he remembered where he was when Sid scored the Golden Goal in 2010.
“That’s the memory of a lifetime right there,” said Reinhart, who was 14 at the time, living in Vancouver before starting his junior career.
“I was jumping up and down on my couch with a couple families over at my parents’ – there was definitely some rearranging of furniture going on after that.”
Crosby and Drew Doughty are the only two players remaining from the Olympic team in 2006 that Salmond first worked with, and he fully understands what an X-factor the 38-year-old Penguins captain is.
“We talked yesterday about if there is any advantage anymore for our Canadian team, and there is — it’s Sidney Crosby,” said Salmond.
“When you look at our biggest competition I don’t think anyone else has that. It can’t be overstated. I saw it again at the 4 Nations. He has this incredible ability to bring people together. There’s this belief within the team that they don’t want to let him down. They want to carry on the legacy he’s created.”
Twelve years after his Olympic win in Sochi, Crosby said he’s grateful for another chance to play in the Olympic tourney NHL players have been denied of for far too long.
“I know how special the opportunity is and what it means,” said Crosby, one of the 24 players from Canada’s 4 Nations Face-off invited as part of a 42-man camp.
“It’s motivating. You can feel the energy coming off of 4 Nations. That was huge. I think everyone got a taste of international hockey and what the Olympics are going to look like.”
Does he anticipate the style of play will be similar to a tourney marked by a trio of fights with the Americans?
“Good question, it’s an NHL surface so I would think that as far as structure it will be pretty similar,” said Crosby, whose club will only have three days in Italy to practice before the February tourney.
“But you look at the skill level and speed, it’s a whole other level. If it’s anything like 4 Nations it’s going to be fast.”
One day into the Team Canada gathering McDavid is already sensing the Olympics is so much bigger than anything he’s ever experienced.
“It unites the country,” said McDavid, one of the locks to be on the team when the roster is submitted in late December.
“I know for myself the hockey at 4 Nations was the fastest, tightest checking, most difficult hockey I’ve ever played, so I can only imagine what it’s going to be at the Olympics. That’s what everybody wants, sport at the highest level.”
Women’s team bolster odds
Unlike the men’s team, the women will stick around for the next two weeks, spending plenty of time on the ice before the players jet off to their respective pro teams.
Because of the newly formed PWHL, the Canadian team won’t spend the winter growing together like years’ past. However, Salmond said that over three camps the Canadian women will spend 50 of the 160 days leading up to the tourney together, which is more than any other program.
“I think that’s going to give us an advantage,” said Salmond.
“If the women’s game is a 50-50 proposition, we’d like to make it 60-40.”
Marie-Philip Poulin will be playing in her fifth Olympics, but dodged talk of it being her last such opportunity, insisting she’s not thinking about that.
The Canadian women have won five of the seven Olympic golds, and are defending champs. Despite playing alongside their American counterparts in the PWHL, they insist there is still just as much animosity between the two sides as ever.
“There’s fire there, there’s always going to be, and that’s why it’s one of the best rivalries in the sport,” said Poulin.
Sarah Nurse, Sarah Fillier and Poulin spoke glowingly about this week’s opportunity to share stories, compare notes and socialize with the men’s and para players.
As part of Hockey Canada’s Rise Together mantra, the goal is for Canada to win gold in all three events for the very first time.
Canada’s para team has only won Paralympic gold once (2006), with the Americans winning each of the last four as part of a rivalry that has seen Canada fall in each of the last two gold medal games.
“We’ve always had a long-standing rivalry with the U.S., and we’ve taken our fair share of punches to the mouth,” said three-time Paralympian Tyler McGregor.
“But they should have hit us a bit harder because we keep coming back every time.”
