2020 Team North America would win the World Cup of Hockey

In the 2016 World Cup of Hockey, the National Hockey League dropped all pretense of an honest best-on-best tournament. The NHL had an eight-team tournament planned out, but there is a clear top-six among international hockey teams. So two other teams were concocted, a Team Europe, consisting of the best European (and effectively the best non-North American) players from outside of the hockey-mad nations of Sweden, Finland, Russia, and Czech Republic, and a Team North America, consisting of the best players from North America age 23 and younger.

Team North America: 2016 Edition was not the best team in the tournament, and the final result reflected this, but it became the most entertaining part of the tournament. The roster was uneven but fast and exciting, and if you leaf through the names on it in 2020, it seems impossible the team ever lost a game.

There is no World Cup of Hockey 2020, and that’s not because the NHL season is still going on right as the tournament would be approaching—it’s because nothing fun is allowed to happen. But I wondered what would became of a hypothetical 2020 World Cup and I created what I would expect to be the eight teams in the tournament. I might share them later. But for now, I’m sharing the best team. And it ain’t Canada. It’s the young guns of Team North America.

Team North America is so good that it effectively decimates the roster of Team United States, and while Team Canada would still surely contend for the Gold Medal, they could really use some of the talent that is instead being funneled to the youngster roster. I want to pretend this team really exists because it is extremely fun and good and fun and good things are fun and good.

Goalies: Carter Hart, Mackenzie Blackwood, Jake Oettinger

I don’t really have much to say about Oettinger, a solid 21 year-old minor leaguer in the Dallas Stars organization. Barring injury, he would never even dress for TNA. The real headliners are Carter Hart and Mackenzie Blackwood, respectively 22 year-old and 23 year-old Canadians from the Metropolitan division who were teammates for Canada at the 2019 World Championships. Hart is slightly more acclaimed, after his career with the Philadelphia Flyers got off to a red-hot start which resulted in Calder votes in 2018-19, while Blackwood has the worse goals against average (though by save percentage, the more telling statistic, they’re nearly dead-even). Carter Hart has been the more consistent goalie, even if the Flyers’ team edge over the New Jersey Devils is a major contributing factor to that, so he would get the starts, but Blackwood would be waiting in the wings. Either of these guys could probably be the #2 goalie for a proper Team Canada behind Carey Price, though, so even though goalie tends to be a position for relatively old players, Team North America wouldn’t exactly be hurting.

Forward Line 1: Kyle Connor, Connor McDavid, Alex DeBrincat

2016 captain Connor McDavid is, somehow, still only 23, and comes back to captain Team North America despite the fact that he is more than capable of getting an “A” for Team Canada if he were allowed. As he is the best player in the world, it should be no surprise he is on the first line. He is flanked on his left side by another Connor, of the Kyle variety—the American winger is probably the second-best pure goal scorer on the roster, having eclipsed the 30-goal mark in each of the last two seasons with the Winnipeg Jets, including a career-best 38 in 2019-20. This will be Connor’s only chance at TNA, as he becomes ineligible in December, but he gets his shot in (fictional, imaginary) 2020. And on the right side is another sniper in Chicago Blackhawks right winger Alex DeBrincat, an undersized forward who had a down 2019-20 but tallied 41 goals in 2018-19. This is a line of pure offensive glory, and this is still a team that very much goes four lines deep.

Forward Line 2: Matthew Tkachuk, Auston Matthews, Mitch Marner

Like the first line, this line has two Americans and one Canadian, but unlike the first line, it has a pair of actual linemates in Toronto Maple Leafs young guns Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner. Matthews, who will be a preposterous power play threat with McDavid, tallied 47 goals in 70 games last season and has 158 scores in his four-year NHL career, and Marner has been the main guy setting up Matthews—the duo are of split nationalities, so this is a last opportunity for them to play at an “international” level. And with Matthew Tkachuk, Marner’s OHL teammate with the London Knights, the line has a physical pest, but he’s far from a goon—the Calgary Flame is a nearly point-per-game player who can act as a crease-patrolling rebound artist.

Forward Line 3: Pierre-Luc Dubois, Jack Eichel, Brock Boeser

Although Pierre-Luc Dubois isn’t quite the volume scorer that Connor or Tkachuk is, he was nevertheless the leading scorer for a playoff Columbus Blue Jackets team and has proven capable as a big-bodied forward who can also win you a face-off from time to time (he actually has a higher winning percentage in his career than the center on this line). While Jack Eichel has been a bit overshadowed in his career compared to Connor McDavid and Auston Matthews, the #2 pick in the 2015 NHL Draft is probably still America’s second-best center of any age (behind Matthews) and has scored more than a point per game for each of the last two seasons, tallying 36 goals and 42 assists with the Buffalo Sabres in 2019-20. And while Brock Boeser hasn’t quite reached the acclaim of Dubois or especially Eichel, he has proven to be a formidable power play presence with the Vancouver Canucks.

Forward Line 4: Jake Debrusk, Mathew Barzal, Travis Konecny

Line 4 is the conventional checking line, but on a team with this much talent from which to draw, this is a line good enough to be a first line on most NHL teams. Jake Debrusk is a terrific two-way forward who is often overshadowed among a stacked Boston Bruins forward corps, but his discipline and occasional scoring punch make him a formidable twelfth forward. Mathew Barzal is most definitely not the prototype of a fourth-line center, but the crisp-passing New York Islander is far too talented to exclude (and he’s gotten Selke votes, too, so it’s not as though he’s completely miscast). And Travis Konecny, a center for the Philadelphia Flyers but surely capable of playing on the wing, is coming off a career-high 61 points in 66 games, including 24 goals.

Defensive Pairing 1: Zach Werenski, Cale Makar

On the left side, Team North America gets Zach Werenski, the most established NHL defenseman of the group. He leads the defensive group in career goals and assists, and the Columbus Blue Jackets mainstay receives consistently glowing marks by Defensive Point Shares. Paired with the relative veteran Werenski is a youngster in Cale Makar, but one who is among the highest upside players on the entire roster. The 21 year-old Colorado Avalanche sensation tallied 50 points in 57 games and produced sterling defensive numbers to go with it. Even if his defense is somewhat less established than some of his righty alternatives, his offensive production makes him a strong first-pairing choice.

Defensive Pairing 2: Quinn Hughes, Charlie McAvoy

Following a pairing with a relatively established lefty and a rookie righty, the second pairing for TNA flips the script. Quinn Hughes tallied 56 points and while the 20 year-old American has been largely overshadowed by his younger brother Jack, the Vancouver Canucks point man has been the superior NHL player. On the right side is Charlie McAvoy, an instant mainstay for the Boston Bruins who has spent most of the last three seasons on the top pairing for perpetual contenders. McAvoy helps to mask whatever questions are rightfully still asked about Hughes.

Defensive Pairing 3: Vince Dunn, Adam Fox

It undeniably lacks the punch of the top two pairings, but Team North America could certainly do worse than Dunn and Fox. While Vince Dunn is currently in the midst of a playoff series to forget with the St. Louis Blues, he has been a puck-possessing god for the last three seasons and packs a scoring punch. Adam Fox is less established, having just played his first NHL games last season and not being an especially acclaimed prospect prior to that, but he averaged over half a point per game with the New York Rangers and was a top-twenty player in the NHL by Defensive Point Shares last season. Dunn and Fox would presumably not play more than ten minutes or so a night, but each could fit well into the special teams picture, Dunn on the power play and Fox on the penalty kill.

Healthy Scratches: Jakob Chychrun, Clayton Keller

In addition to the aforementioned Jake Oettinger, a pair of Arizona Coyotes crack the roster as depth—Jakob Chychrun, a slightly poorer man’s version of Vince Dunn, and Clayton Keller, who might have been the best forward last season on a Coyotes team that has Phil Kessel on it. Yep, this team is absurdly good. They’re winning the fake gold medal in my head.