Canwest News Service
Washington Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau doesn’t try to hide the fact his best defenceman Mike Green wants desperately to be part of Team Canada when the Olympics begin here in Vancouver.
There’s no quiet agenda going on, it’s pretty much open and Green is the same way. He doesn’t want to seem to be lobbying for a position, but he’s pretty clear that he thinks he can play low-risk hockey if that’s what the Canadian coaching staff is ultimately going to want from him.
And let’s be clear. With Jacques Lemaire and Ken Hitchcock affecting any advice Mike Babcock might be giving executive director Steve Yzerman and his co-GMs, Kevin Lowe and Ken Holland, with respect to picking the team, high risk is apt to be frowned upon.
“Mike can be as low-risk as you like, but why would we [the Caps] want to play that way?” said Boudreau. “I understand they didn’t have any problems with him at the orientation camp. I ask him to be more offensive with our team, but that doesn’t mean he can’t play any way you like.
“There was a time when he made young mistakes, like they all do, but that’s changed. If we’re in a 3-2 hockey game in the third period, he knows he’s got to buckle down.
“But why wouldn’t they want him on that team? He’s the best offensive defenceman in the game. If you’re going to name seven defencemen, why on earth wouldn’t he be one of them? Do you think you’re going to beat the Russians without scoring any goals?”
He makes an excellent point. And to review, what was Canada’s problem in Turin? If you’ll recall, they couldn’t put the puck in the ocean and the push from the back end was negligible. If the thinking is that this is going to change just because the scenery changes, there may be a surprise in Vancouver again. Somehow, losing to Switzerland would seem even less palatable here.
“I’ve made a conscious effort to cut down the chances I’m taking this year,” Green said Thursday, acknowledging that this is the perception which could keep him off the team even though he enters to-night’s game with the Canucks at a plus-12 rating.
“There was a time when I made mistakes, took maybe a few too many chances, but I think I’ve made great strides in cutting that down. If they need some offence, somebody with the skill set I have, then I’d like to be that guy.”
Another clear bonus if Canada ends up having to play Russia in the quarters, semis or final is his precise knowledge of how Alexander Ovechkin and Alexander Semin generate the offence they do, to say nothing of the same knowledge of Sweden’s Nicklas Backstrom who is certain to be a key to the offence of the defending Olympic champions.
“They do have little tricks, subtle things I’ve noticed they do to be as effective as they are,” said Green. “And that’s pretty hard to pick up watching them on television. I feel sorry for guys [defencemen] in the West out here who see them once maybe every two years. It’s pretty tough to get a feel for what they’re going to be trying to do.”
Yzerman has been at three or four Capitals games since the season began and clearly Green has been the focus when his attention has switched to the Caps.
Reporters in Washington insist he tries to hide the fact he’s there, but it’s not to hard to identify his hardest and most important decisions will come on the back end.
It’s pretty clear Shea Weber, Dan Boyle, Duncan Keith and Scott Niedermayer are going to be there — although the latter, who has been used in all their advertising and was virtually named the captain by Babcock in August — has been struggling terribly.
The fact Keith and Richmond’s Brent Seabrook have played together so successfully may give the former Delta Ice Hawk an inside track on another spot and the Lemaires and Hitchcocks of the world will likely insist on a shutdown guy like Chris Pronger to kill penalties, he still a plus-8 on a struggling Flyers team.
Green is all to aware that it’s a tight squeeze to get in and so is Boudreau, although the Caps coach would likely make Green the first pick.
“Bobby Orr was a great defensive defenceman as well when he needed to be,” said Boudreau. “But that wasn’t his reputation, was it?”
