Oilers first-round pick selected for Team Canada
Oilers first-rounder fulfils dream of playing for Team Canada
If street hockey kids aren't going top shelf in Game 7 of a Stanley Cup final, they're wrapped in a Maple Leaf and going to coast to coast for Team Canada.
Well, Dylan Holloway can scratch one of those items off his bucket list after being named to the Canadian world junior team Friday.
The Edmonton Oilers draft pick (14th overall in October) says being picked to wear the Canadian colours is every bit as good as he imagined it would be.
“It's unbelievable. It's been a goal of mine since I was a little kid and now that it's here, it's really special,” said the 19-yearold former Okotoks Oiler.
“I remember watching the world juniors as a kid and just dreaming about being able to play in it. It's really a dream come true. I'm super thrilled.”
Hockey Canada staff came into Holloway's Red Deer hotel room, with his mom on Facetime so she could share it with him, when they broke the news.
“It was great that I got to experience that with her.”
It was hardly a typical selection camp for any of the 25 players who made it, especially Holloway. The six-foot-one, 201-pound centre went straight into isolation after arriving from the University of Wisconsin, then went straight into a 14-day quarantine after a pair of players tested positive in camp. That's not the environment you're looking for when trying to impress the coaches, but he did enough before he arrived (scoring two goals in two games with the Badgers) and when skating resumed in Red Deer to win the job.
“I was a little concerned at the start, when we were in our own little (three-person isolation) group and then the quarantine hit,” said Holloway, who put an exclamation point on his bid by scoring in the final Red-white scrimmage before the cuts.
“But I was confident in myself. I already played two games with Wisconsin back in Madison. I thought that even with the smallest opportunity, I was going to make the most out of it.
“I'm just happy it all worked out in the end. I think we have a ton of skill, a lot of unbelievable players in all the positions. I'm really liking the look of our team.”
With 14 first-round picks at forward alone on the roster, this is a Canadian team overflowing with talent. Since they can't fit 14 players on the first line, some of them must learn to adapt to lesser roles, which is fine with Holloway.
“I could see myself almost becoming a shutdown, hard-toplay-against guy,” he said. “And some PK (penalty kill).”
While it was far from a normal selection year, Alan Miller of the Hockey Canada Program of Excellence said team brass did everything they could to make the right choices with what little information they had.
“Everybody understands the challenges these young men went through at camp, that this was not a normal year in terms of evaluating the players and putting this team together under some difficult circumstances,” he said, adding that in addition to the quarantine, the lack of exhibition games, not having a summer camp and not having a Canada-russia series made things even murkier.
“But we're really excited we have our team. This group gives our coaching staff a lot of balance and flexibility. This is a fast, skilled, very deep group. Our expectations are going into Edmonton and defending our gold medal.”
Head coach Andre Tourigny doesn't want to get ahead of himself, but he knows what he has and believes that with the emphasis on speed and skill, the Canadians will be fun to watch and tough to keep up with.
“We'll try to push the pace as much as we can to separate ourselves,” he said.
“And on defence, we can skate really well, move the puck, play steady shutdown roles. All of our D are good defensively. I like the makeup of our D a lot.”
The Canadians had until Dec. 13 to set their final roster, but wanted to move things up to give their guys an opportunity to exhale and jell as a team before heading back into a five-day quarantine in Edmonton.
“Three days will give us time to share good times together, have some laughs and be in more of a team environment instead of 46 guys trying to fight each other to make the team,” said Tourigny.
“We have three days to build some chemistry and also practice as a team.”
It's become routine now: Five days of practice, 14 days of quarantine, five days of practice and then another five days of quarantine.
“We'll have three more good practices as a team, then quarantine, then three more good practices and then we'll have Sweden and Russia waiting for us,” said Tourigny. “We're excited about what's ahead.”
All that's left to do is win a gold medal, right?
“We have an identity,” said Tourigny. “We have a way we want to play and we believe that if we do what we have to do and we play the game the right way, we will be a tough team to play against.
“How good we will be — our actions will determine that, not our words.”