Quote:
Originally Posted by SuperMatt18
Canada was starting from a position way ahead though...Canada maybe hasn't been passed yet but the other nations are catching up.
Goalies: USA is ahead of Canada when it comes to developing goalies right now and I'm not sure that's even debatable. I'm taking Hellebuyck, Demko, Oettinger, Swayman over any of the Canadian goalies. Adin Hill might be Canada's best goalie and he never represented Canada at the junior level.
Defensemen: Closer than it's ever been...Makar is still the best in the world but Fox, Hughes, McAvoy, Slavin...it's getting closer here too.
Forwards: The top couple guys are still Canadian (Mackinnon, McDavid, Crosby) but the Americans are no slouches with Matthews, Tkachuk, Hughes etc
In my opinion there really is no wrong answer at this point on CHL vs NCAA and either development stream is good and the right path would be dependent on your individual situation as a player.
At the NHL level it's closer than ever though. Of the top 31 point scorers in the NHL this season (38 points+) only 11 are Canadian.
I'm guessing there would be no other season where that few Canadians make up the top 30 point getters in the NHL.
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I think the Americans are making up ground, how much that is to do with the numbers of players they have and their system being better than ours I think would have to be looked at.
But when you see that we still have the most top end talent drafted each year, the most players overall drafted each year, we put 3 competitive teams into the U18 tournaments vs 1 from every other country, won the last 2 WJHC's, was competitive in this tournament missing 6 players that would play in the top 6/top 4 of every team in the tournament that saying we have an archaic development system (not you but the original post by someone else that started this) is pretty hyperbolic and not really representative of what is actually happening in hockey development.