I want to preface this blog by saying that I am not at all trying to make any excuses for the lackluster performance of Team USA. The team was absolutely flawed from the top down. Poor management led to poor personnel decisions and the wrong choice for head coach.
That said:
I am dumbfounded listening to these so called hockey experts talking about Team North America like it is some great surprise that they are this good. What league have they been covering, because it is a well known fact that the NHL is a young man's game. The days of "you must have experience to win" are over and have been for some time.
The GMs that recognized this are the one's that have produced winning organizations. The one's that still operated in the "old school" environment simply got passed by.
From the very beginning when they announced the format it was very clear that Team North America would be very competitive with all the high end talent that has come along the last few years led by Connor McDavid, Jack Eichel, Auston Matthews, and Johnny Gaudreau just to name a few. What else was very clear from the start, was the fact that Team USA would be severely crippled by this format as well.
I keep hearing that who ever came up with the Team North America concept should be applauded, and I agree but not completely. My disagreement is that there was no foresight into thinking how this would affect the two Nations whom which these players were coming from. Canada is so deep in talent that they could field two teams and have them both be highly competitive, but the US does not have that same luxury, thus taking that top end talent from Team USA severely impacted their roster.
No excuses for Team USA and their poor performance, but it is a fact that USA hockey is in a very good place and the talent that is being produced from all over the country is stronger than ever.