Once again, it was a tough year for Canada at the World Junior Championship.
Despite hosting the tournament, Team Canada came up way short, falling 4-3 in the quarterfinals once again to Team Czechia on Thursday.
That also means that Carolina Hurricanes 2023 first-rounder Bradly Nadeau’s tournament is over as well.
The whole tournament just overall seemed like a huge shortcoming for Team Canada in terms of selections and deployment.
For starters, Nadeau, one of Canada’s best pure snipers played either in the bumper or the net front on the power play and he wasn’t the only player forced to play an unusual position.
The two biggest issues for Canada seemed to be that poor roster construction and management from the top brass and just overall undisciplined play by the Canadians.
Overall though, it was just a really bad offensive performance for the Canadians who only scored 13 goals in five games, despite 205 shots generated.
However, Nadeau had two of those goals though and was the only player on the team to have multiple goals in the tournament, with both coming in clutch moments for Canada.
Nadeau’s first goal was a third-period equalizer in Canada’s round-robin game against Team USA. He wheeled out from the bumper into the low circle, a position more familiar to him, and bombed a one-timer for a big goal.
The second was another third-period equalizer in the quarterfinals against the Czechs, as Nadeau found a loose puck right above the crease, but yet another bad penalty by the Canadians saw a later power play goal end their tournament despite Nadeau’s efforts.
It was a strong showing for Nadeau who played over 15 minutes per game in the tournament and looked as he should as one of the few players with pro experience.
He handled the puck well, played responsibly on both sides of the puck and didn’t take any penalties which is perhaps even more impressive than the goals given Canada’s showing.
Now, Nadeau will return to the Chicago Wolves of the AHL where he can continue his development somewhere that will actually utilize him properly.
