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Tortorella Scratches Dubinsky and Johnson as Team USA Falters

September 21, 2016, 1:25 PM ET [14 Comments]
Paul Berthelot
Columbus Blue Jackets Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
The most anticipated game of the World Cup of Hockey did not live up to the expectations. Team USA built around grit were supposed to be designed to beat Canada. Well it was clear right away that Team USA had more grit they lacked the skill to keep up with Team Canada. USA opened the scoring, but held the lead for just 1:29. Canada held a 3-1 lead after the first period and essentially cruised from there.

John Tortorella made some interesting line-up decisions prior to the game, electing to scratch Brandon Dubinsky and Jack Johnson for Kyle Palmieri Dustin Byfuglien. Byfuglien for Johnson was a glaringly obvious switch to make but Palmieri for Dubinsky was an interesting one. The thought always seemed to be that Dubinsky was on the team so that he could matchup against Crosby in this game. Dubisnky has matched up against Crosby many times before when the Blue Jackets have played the Penguins. Dubinsky plays Crosby hard, even going over the edge but he has been able to get Crosby off his game. It doesn’t make much sense for Dubinsky to be on the team if you were not going to play him in this game. A very odd coaching decision.

Team North America suffered their first loss of the tournament losing to Sergei Bobrovsky and Team Russia. Bob must have felt right at home in this game. Team North America completely controlled the play peppering Bob with 46 shots. Russia only managed 26 shots but managed to score four goals, all in the second period to take the game 4-3.

Much like the game against Sweden this one isn’t even close if Bob isn’t in net. He made some tremendous saves, particularly late in the game with Team North America putting the pressure on with the goalie pulled.




It was great to see Bob play well but I think many Blue Jacket fans were rooting for Team North America.

The Blue Jackets trio on TNA continue to see low ice time totals. Brandon Saad saw the third lowest time among forwards at 11:34. Seth Jones and Ryan Murray saw very little ice time in the third period with TNA pushing to tie the game. All three players have been given that defensive role and the coaching staff is sticking with that.

Some bad news from Team North America is that they may be down a couple defencemen for their game today against Sweden. Aaron Ekblad was hurt in the game against Russia and Murray suffered an injury in practice. Ekblad has returned to Florida while Murray is still in Toronto but his status for the game today is uncertain.




If Murray can’t go it doesn’t sound like there is much of a back-up plan. I expect him to play but it may be in an even more reduced role.

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