Canadian Teams

[tourneytickssince59]

How do Canadian Bantam AA, A teams compare with Minnesota Bantam AA, A teams? Are the better Canadian players playing at a Junior level so their association teams are not as good as Minnesota teams? Just curious if anyone has any insight.

[Dog]

Like anything, it depends (area/city, association, # kids, etc). Winnepeg and Thunder Bay have very strong top end teams. Canada classifies everything with "A" so the are no B or C teams.
Most times when Canadian teams come down to tourneys in MN, from what I've seen, they're overly fair in where they categorize the team and they get beat up a bit as they probably could play a class down. From my perspective, they re as lize it and don't seem to care ("play the best" type of thought)
Long story, short.... it's Canada.... their top end teams are good... and their kids are typically pretty solid at every level.

[blueline_6]

Interesting, as I've experienced exactly the opposite. One of my kids was a C level player all through youth hockey. Every time we were in a tournament in Minnesota that had Canadian teams in it, they typically looked like B1 level teams. And when we would check their youth club site, it was not their bottom level teams that they were sending down to play in Minnesota C tournaments. At a hotel in Duluth I ended up chatting with a parent (from Neebing if I recall correctly) about why they enter C tournaments instead of B and the response was pretty honest, "Yea, we're not going to travel all the way down here to lose."

[The Exiled One]

Another thing to keep in mind is that Canadian teams are organized by birthyear. For example, an '05 team would play at the bantam level as would an '06 team. Obviously, you'd expect the '05 AA team to fair much better than the '06 AA team.

[elliott70]

How do Canadian Bantam AA, A teams compare with Minnesota Bantam AA, A teams? Are the better Canadian players playing at a Junior level so their association teams are not as good as Minnesota teams? Just curious if anyone has any insight.

Go to
Bemidji Youth Hockey webpage
They have a rule of thumb conversion chart.

[muckandgrinder65]

Argument could be made that 2 or 3
Midget Major teams could come to the X and roll. The best players are already playing Juniors like the W or QMJHL or OHL.

[defense]

Interesting, as I've experienced exactly the opposite. One of my kids was a C level player all through youth hockey. Every time we were in a tournament in Minnesota that had Canadian teams in it, they typically looked like B1 level teams. And when we would check their youth club site, it was not their bottom level teams that they were sending down to play in Minnesota C tournaments. At a hotel in Duluth I ended up chatting with a parent (from Neebing if I recall correctly) about why they enter C tournaments instead of B and the response was pretty honest, "Yea, we're not going to travel all the way down here to lose."

Did they have "c" hockey though??? Programs who have " c" hockey are very few anywhere.

[defense]

How do Canadian Bantam AA, A teams compare with Minnesota Bantam AA, A teams? Are the better Canadian players playing at a Junior level so their association teams are not as good as Minnesota teams? Just curious if anyone has any insight.

Kind of an aside but here it goes: circa '98 or '99 I played a AAA team from Littleton Co. We lost lopsided, but it was more depth than talent. It was in a tournament of course, it was a bantam B tournament in Fargo and we met them in the consolation championship. Our players were rough and thus we ended up with one player on the bench for half the game, thus the lopsided victory for the Coloradans. I know that given our best game (this was our fifth game in two and a half days) we stood a better chance. We ended up bronze at the north regional in mn that year, we got upset otherwise were in the championship. Point is, no matter the level or grade of team, that team is put out as the grade of team for that program period. I know there are programs in MN whose A team would lose convincingly to other MN progeams' B teams. Food for thought, my two cents.

And my mn peewee team pounded a Winnipeg team as well.

Another side to it is: the Minnesota Hockey rep from the district where the tourney is located or where the MN team is from has to OK that game. This is because MN is it's own district in USA Hockey. Again food for thought.

[blueline_6]

Interesting, as I've experienced exactly the opposite. One of my kids was a C level player all through youth hockey. Every time we were in a tournament in Minnesota that had Canadian teams in it, they typically looked like B1 level teams. And when we would check their youth club site, it was not their bottom level teams that they were sending down to play in Minnesota C tournaments. At a hotel in Duluth I ended up chatting with a parent (from Neebing if I recall correctly) about why they enter C tournaments instead of B and the response was pretty honest, "Yea, we're not going to travel all the way down here to lose."

Did they have "c" hockey though??? Programs who have " c" hockey are very few anywhere.

The letter doesn't matter. In Minnesota "C" is our bottom level classification in youth hockey: A (AA & A), B (B1 & B2), C. So wherever you are coming from, whether it's Canada, Iowa, North Dakota, Wisconsin, whatever...if you're going to enter a Minnesota "C" tournament, you should send your bottom level team. In Canadian Minor hockey that is typically an "A" team since their nationally recognized competitive teams are classified as AAA, AA and A. But our experience in Minnesota "C" tournaments was that Canadian associations were sending their "AA" teams, which would be comparable to "B" in MN youth hockey.

[goldy313]

I was coaching a bantam B team in a tournament at the super rink in Blaine. We were playing a team from Thunder Bay in the championship, they walked through their bracket which was far tougher than ours that we struggled through. We were losing 8 or 9 to 0 in the second period when a slap shot hit our goalie in the head and broke his mask, we only had one goalie. We stopped the second period and resurfaced the ice so we could try and fix the mask. We couldn’t.

The Thunder Bay coach came over and offered us their second goalie, I sarcastically replied that I would take half his players too. A couple of minutes later a goalie and 7 skaters showed up at my door. I sent 7 back and we finished the game out at something like 12-3.

The Thunder Bay team ordered pizza for their kids and parents at the rink before their trip home. After the game their parents gave up their pizza so all the kids from both teams could eat together. It is one of my best memories of coaching.

[elliott70]

I was coaching a bantam B team in a tournament at the super rink in Blaine. We were playing a team from Thunder Bay in the championship, they walked through their bracket which was far tougher than ours that we struggled through. We were losing 8 or 9 to 0 in the second period when a slap shot hit our goalie in the head and broke his mask, we only had one goalie. We stopped the second period and resurfaced the ice so we could try and fix the mask. We couldn’t.

The Thunder Bay coach came over and offered us their second goalie, I sarcastically replied that I would take half his players too. A couple of minutes later a goalie and 7 skaters showed up at my door. I sent 7 back and we finished the game out at something like 12-3.

The Thunder Bay team ordered pizza for their kids and parents at the rink before their trip home. After the game their parents gave up their pizza so all the kids from both teams could eat together. It is one of my best memories of coaching.

Nice story, Goldy.
Its not always about the scoreboard.