The U.S. Olympic men's hockey roster prioritized physicality, faceoff specialists, and truculence over top scorers and high-scoring defensemen. General manager Bill Guerin excluded several leading American NHL goal scorers and a top point-getting defenseman, instead choosing players who mirror his own aggressive playing style. Canada fielded elite offensive talents like Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, and Sidney Crosby, making the matchup a high-stakes test. The American approach nearly failed during a tense, hyped final, but a sudden-death overtime goal produced a 2-1 victory and the program's first Olympic gold since 1980. U.S. player development improvement over two decades supplied greater skill depth.
"The people who built the U.S. Olympic men's hockey team used a roster-building strategy that was right on the edge between bold and insane. Their approach almost destroyed them on Sunday, in one of the most-hyped and most-consequential games in the history of the sport. And then, in sudden-death overtime, that strategy worked perfectly, delivering the United States a 2-1 victory, its biggest hockey triumph since the 1980 Miracle on Ice, the last time this program won a gold medal."
"Three of the four leading American goal scorers in the NHL this year, all with 30 goals in not even three-quarters of a season, did not make the roster. The NHL's No. 2 point-getting defenseman also did not make the roster. Nor did the New York Rangers' Adam Fox, a former Norris Trophy winner who's averaging nearly a point a game in the NHL for head coach Mike Sullivan's lousy New York Rangers."
Read at Slate Magazine
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