Quarantine fun and games for Byram
Team Canada defenceman playing games, enjoying tunes
Bowen Byram's scouting report on the NHL 21 video game version of himself remains incomplete.
The Vancouver Giants' all-everything defenceman is playing EA Sports' latest incarnation to help pass the time as he and 45 other players at the Team Canada world junior tryout camp are quarantined in their Red Deer hotel rooms.
He's not paying much attention to how good the Bowen Byram in that video game actually is, it would seem.
“I don't think I've looked at his rating, although I have played as the Vancouver Giants a couple of times,” Byram, the 19-yearold from Cranbrook, said with a chuckle. “I'll have to take a look and see if he's pulling his weight.”
Byram sounds like he's in a decent head space as he waits out this two-week lockdown at the Alberta training camp brought about by two players testing positive for the COVID-19 virus.
The quarantine ends Monday. Coaches and other team staff have also been included in the self-isolation.
“It's going to be weird to go downstairs for breakfast that day,” Byram said. “It's going to be weird to see the other guys. It's going to be weird to have conversations in person.”
Byram says that the team is working out twice a day as a group via Zoom. Each player has a stationary bike in his room.
Also via Zoom, there's a daily team meeting, and then a nightly team social, which features a particular activity. They've had guest speakers for those, including Max Kerman, the frontman for Hamilton rock band The Arkells.
“He was great,” Byram said of Kerman, who is close friends with Toronto Maple Leafs general manager Kyle Dubas. “He told some stories, he played some quick ver
sions of a couple of songs. I hadn't listened much to their music before, but I'm a big fan now.”
Along with NHL 21, Byram's been playing Call of Duty, a first-person shooter game. He's also been catching up on his reading, and James Patterson's crime thriller Along Came a Spider is his favourite book so far during this stint.
“It's been a good pastime for me,” said Byram, the fourth-overall pick of the Colorado Avalanche in the 2019 NHL draft. “It's been good to keep your mind going.”
Byram, who is one of six returnees at the camp who helped Team Canada win gold last winter in the Czech Republic, had been dominating the early going on the ice in Red Deer.
Fellow returnee Dylan Cozens, a Lethbridge Hurricanes forward,
had this to say to TSN's Mark Masters about Byram: “He definitely took a huge jump this off-season. He was great to begin with, but now he's taken his game to another level. He's so calm out there, so shifty, agile and just watching him with the puck and go around the O-zone, I could tell something switched with him in the off-season and he's a whole new player."
Byram spent a part of his off-season in a training group based out of Planet Ice Delta, set up by Delta Hockey Academy's Ian Gallagher. Ty Smith, 20, the Spokane Chiefs' stalwart rearguard who's been a member of the past two Team Canada world junior sides, was among the other regulars there.
Byram was also with the Avalanche through their playoff run in the Edmonton bubble as a member
of their taxi squad.
“I was feeling really good out there,” Byram said of his early going at Team Canada camp.
“It's disappointing what's happened, but we're all in the same boat. We're all doing the best we can. The training staff has been great with us. We have the bikes, which has been huge. I know I feel my best when I'm biking lots.”
A 6-1, 195-pound left-shot rearguard, Byram posted a ridiculous 11 goals and 31 points in Vancouver's final 17 games before the WHL shut down the regular season in March. They'd eventually call off the playoffs and Memorial Cup national tournament in Kelowna as well due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Byram was crucial to the Giants' run to the 2019 league final, lead
ing all WHL players in playoff scoring (26 points, 22 games).
He's not age eligible to play in the minors, so he must return to the WHL if he doesn't stick with the Avalanche this coming season.
The Avalanche have only six defencemen on their NHL roster currently. Byram signed his threeyear, entry-level contract in July 2019.
The WHL set Jan. 8 as its opening night back in October, but hockey insider John Shannon reported on Twitter this week that could get pushed back into February.
The world juniors are set to be held in a bubble in Edmonton. The tournament is scheduled to start Christmas Day at Rogers Place. Team Canada plays Germany on Boxing Day in its opener.