Jack Eichel posted this photo on his Instagram account late Friday afternoon.
Eichel clearly wasn't ready for his World Cup of Hockey experience to come to an end. That just means Eichel, his teammates and coaches were expecting to achieve their pre-tournament goals of not just showing up but winning all of their games and playing in the semifinals and the three game final series.
If you dream it, you can be it.
It was clear to my eyes that Eichel and his bad of Millennial Mercenaries were in the World Cup to win it all.
Jack will be nimble. Jack will be quick. Jack will jump back to Buffalo with his hockey stick.
Buffalo Sabres head coach Dan Bylsma said Friday that any day now he expects to see his super sophomore center Jack Eichel on the ice at HARBORCenter.
Eichel will be in excellent physical and cardio condition when he arrives. The Boston native just logged a ton of ice time for Team North at the America World Cup.
Eichel and North America were bounced from the tourney on Thursday when Team Finland failed to defeat Team Russia. Had Finland defeated Russia, it would have forced up a dream Hockey Night In Canada match-up between Eichel-McDavid-Matthews and the show-stealing Young Guns against Marchand-Crosby-Bergeron and the true grit of Team Canada.
Steven Tyler was correct. You have to lose before you can win.
Dream On. Dream until your dreams come true.
Eichel will be shipping back to Buffalo to join his Sabres teammates at training camp this weekend.
Eichel played in all six games for the Young Stars, including three exhibition games.
Here are Eichel's game by game stats:
World Cup of Hockey Tourney games:
9/21 @ SWE 1 assist, +1 , 5 SOG, 16:16 TOI, 19 shifts
9/19 vs. RUS zero points, -2, 1 SOG, 14:02, 16 shifts
9/18 @ FIN 1 PPGl, +1, 2 SOG, 14:31 TOI, 20 shifts
**
Exhibition games:
9/14 vs. CZE zero points, even, 1 SOG, 18:18 TOI, 20 shifts
9/11 vs. EUR 1 assist, +1, 5 SOG, 16:12 TOI, 18 shifts
9/8 @ EUR 1 assist, +1, 4 SOG, 15:14 TOI, 18 shifts
Team North finished the tourney with a 2-1 record. Their lone tourney loss was to Russia by one chintzy goal. Eichel, McDavid, Matthews, Gostisbehere, Parayko, Gaudreau, MacKinnon and the Young Guns will be haunted by their second period collapse for a long time. Russia scored four goals in that disastrous period. To their credit, the kids battled back in the period period to make it a game and nearly tied it at the end when they had a 6-on-4 power play.
“We’ll see him back at the rink the next couple of days and have a conversation about when he’ll get back on the ice,” Bylsma said Friday.
Eichel has already been ruled out of Buffalo's first two exhibition games Monday in Minnesota and Tuesday at home vs. Ottawa.
Having just played against the best hockey players in the free world for the past two weeks, Eichel played sensationally for his U-23 squad and will no doubt be bringing his winning spirit and leadership back to Buffalo, which will only help the Sabres to start out their 2016-17 season on the winning way.
Team North America's loss will be Jack Eichel and the Buffalo Sabres' gain.
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