FORMENTON READY TO BE DARK KNIGHT FOR TEAM CANADA
London forward willing to get hands dirty as world juniors squad pares down roster
It’s about finding a role. Any role.
On your junior team, you might be a top-line forward who gets all the goals or an offensive defenceman who quarterbacks the power play. But in a best-on-best tournament featuring the best players in the country, not everyone can be a star attraction.
Some have to take lesser assignments. Some might even have to switch positions.
Wendel Clark was a highly touted defenceman when he arrived at Team Canada’s selection camp in 1985. Two weeks later, he had become a checkingline forward.
“The last day of cuts, I thought I was getting cut, and they said, ‘ Would you be a forward?’ ” Clark said. “I said, ‘I’ll carry the pucks as long as I get to go to Finland.’
“You’re playing for Team Canada. I just wanted to be one of the guys. Whatever it takes.”
Alex Formenton isn’t likely to move back to defence, however, since coming to Canada’s selection camp, he has made the transition from a go-to goal-scorer to someone whose primary job is to get under the skin of opponents.
In Friday’s exhibition game against Denmark — a 5-2 win for Canada — that meant playing an energy role. He skated with pace, hit anything that moved and went hard to the net. He happened to score a garbage goal in the process.
And after the game, he was more concerned with how many hits he delivered — a number he lost count of sometime during the first period.
“I have no idea,” the Ottawa Senators prospect said with a laugh about his hit total. “Just finishing checks, that’s a way to get the puck back. Keep it simple. If you try to do too much, that’s when things start to not happen.”
Indeed, a lack of versatility is one of the reasons why 2017 sixth-overall NHL pick Cody Glass was cut from the team Thursday and why Owen Tippett, selected four spots after Glass, was not even invited to the camp.
Canada has scorers — lots of them. What Hockey Canada is looking for, as the roster is trimmed down to a final 22 bodies, are skilled players willing to get their hands dirty.
“I don’t see them just as checkers,” Team Canada head coach Dominique Ducharme said. “I think they play a complete game and checking is a part of their game. For sure, we need that on our team, obviously. We need a team that is playing well on both sides. From there, it’s about balancing lines and finding the right combinations and chemistry.”
Formenton, who said he has a “little bit of Brad Marchand” in his game, has scored nine goals as part of 21 points in 20 games this season with the Ontario Hockey League’s London Knights. The six-foot-two winger’s strength, though, is his ability to get in on the forecheck and drive the opposition crazy.
It’s a role Formenton said he has always enjoyed, even when he was a foot shorter and playing for the Clark-coached Toronto Young Nationals as a kid. “I always had that grit to my game,” he said. “And just when I grew, I stuck with it.”
“That’s him right there,” added Clark, who was at Friday’s game. “What you’re seeing today is him. You need that. You need those role guys who in junior maybe are a first-line guy, but in world juniors you’re picking the best and you need guys who are coming off the bench playing five, six, seven minutes and are great energy line guys, who are finishing checks and changing the games and bringing positive energy as well.”
Formenton, who played one game with the Senators this fall before being sent back to junior, said the brief experience of playing in the NHL gave him an indication of the type of player he needs to be in order to have success at the next level. Yes, he can score, but he also needs to continue to play with an edge.
The 18-year-old showed that in Friday’s game, especially on his goal. Sensing Canadian defenceman Cal Foote was taking a point shot, Formenton immediately rushed to the net and beat a defender for the easy rebound. It wasn’t pretty, but it was effective.
“I think my time up with the Sens has definitely helped me out a lot, learning from the NHL players that have had success there,” said Formenton, a Barrie, Ont., native drafted 47th overall in 2017. “You always want to be working hard and skating as fast as you can and creating as much energy.”
If you can score a goal in the process, all the better. But like Clark before him, Formenton doesn’t care what he’s doing — as long as he’s doing it for Canada.
“Every team needs an energy player,” Formenton said. “To be that player would be really nice. Creating energy, I think, helps out a team a lot.”