Cleary- Team Canada Could Use Him

from David Staples of The Cult Of Hockey at the Edmonton Journal, ...But if Dan Cleary makes this team—and I expect he will—he won’t be there because his coach Mike Babcock is running the squad and he won’t be there because more talented players are sitting out. From what I saw in last spring’s Stanley Cup finals, Cleary is a uniquely talented player in the game, a guy who goes hard to the net and screens the goalie as well as anyone in hockey right now. He’s also a defensive ace. among the best two-way players in hockey. During the Cup finals, I kept track of scoring chances and also reviewed all of them. I tracked which players did the most to create scoring chances for their own teams. I also tracked which players made the mistakes that led to scoring chances for the other team. In the seven games, Cleary was a key contributor on 32 Detroit scoring chances. He made mistakes that contributed to just four Pittsburgh scoring chances, making him +28 for the series, by far the best mark on any player in the Stanley Cup finals… more