Team North America's success could hinge on how quickly players create chemistry

Again, it is hard to believe that such stellar mix of young hockey talent couldn’t put up a fight in Toronto. (Just look at that top power play unit!) However some players on this squad have already shown that a single player’s efforts can’t make a whole team competitive. Connor McDavid is a prime example, after having a stellar rookie season  that wasn’t enough to save the Edmonton Oilers from a dismal 31-43-8 record at the end of the 2015-16 regular season. Surely nobody knows that more than Oilers’ coach Todd McLellan, who will also be behind the bench for Team North America. McLellan reportedly told NHL.com that his first step in getting a young team that doesn’t know each other well into tournament mode:

“Well, we're trying to jam a lot of information into three days," McLellan said. "You know, we play (pre-tournament game) in three days, and we're trying to give them simple structure and give them an idea of what … we're trying to predict what might happen on the ice for each of them. After that, we're turning them loose and we're going to get them going. So we're walking them through situations, whether it's the power-play breakout, it's our one opportunity."

Then, once that “simple structure” is set, everyone on the Team Young Guns will have to contribute if they are going to match up against the competition. Like 2016 Calder Cup finalist Shayne Gostisbehere being as big of a catalyst as he was for the Philadelphia Flyers making the playoffs this past season, as one example. In a SportsNet article that maps out how Team NA could win the Cup, Jonathan Willis breaks down their keys to success against Team Finland:

“The Finns have three decent forward lines, but only three proven NHL defencemen, making their second and third pairs on the blue line vulnerable to North America’s balanced attack. Players like Nathan MacKinnon and perhaps Auston Matthews, both expected to play on lower lines, will be critical here...”

... and against Team Russia

“Both they and Team North America will be coming off a game the night before, so there won’t be much of a rest advantage, but that shared fatigue should make it easier to grind down a suspect defense… Andrei Markov, likely to be Russia’s best defenseman, turns 38 in December. Dmitri Orlov and Kulikov anchor the other two pairs. That isn’t inspiring. As long as the Young Guns’ defense can hold down the fort—and with Aaron Ekblad, Jacob Trouba, and Seth Jones all anchoring pairings that should be possible—an aggressive attack could win the day.”

This all sounds very doable. With the wealth of talent on Team North America has, there’s no reason that they can’t take the foundation set down by McLellan and Company and then all contribute. But can they do it just a couple of days? Can they all get on the same page soon enough to compete with teams that have had many years to build some solid chemistry?

They will have to, if they want to stay alive in the World Cup of Hockey.