Canada-USA tonight

Canada-USA for the World Junior gold medal tonight. So order a pizza, then take the phone off the hook. Turn out the porch light and disconnect your doorbell. Write the kids' teachers a note certifying that the dog did eat their homework, because nobody in the family is going to want to miss this one.

Am I overselling it? Maybe. Probably. But Canada and the USA have played some very entertaining games at this tournament over the last four or five years and there's no reason to believe that tonight's tilt for all the marbles will be any different.

Canada will have to play tonight's game without key defenceman Travis Hamonic, who is out with a separated shoulder. More confusingly, they may also play (by choice) without defenceman Jared Cowen, who has fallen out of favour with the coaching staff and spent the semifinal game anchored to the bench out of concerns about his lack of footspeed. For tonight, it sounds (according to TSN's Bob McKenzie anyway) like forward Brandon McMillan will be moved back to the blueline to replace Hamonic, rather than use Cowen against the ultra-fast American forwards.

Canada is going to have to find a way to deal with the Americans' speed if they are going to win this game. The Canadian defence was caught off-guard and flat-footed several times in the round-robin meeting and the Americans had more breakaways and odd-man rushes in that game than Canada gave up in all their other games combined. Canada might also be wise to abandon the 1-3-1 powerplay format they were using, since having only one man back on the point resulted in two American shorthanded goals in that game. It didn't help that the man on the point was Ryan Ellis, not known for his defensive inclinations to begin with.....but the Canadians are going to have to play this game more conservatively than they have played so far in this tournament because I don't think they want to give the Americans a good half-dozen breakaways or 2-on-1's like they did on New Years Eve. That's a recipe for a loss.

Should be a gooder, any way you look at it and regardless of which team you cheer for. So yeah, maybe that first paragraph isn't so ridiculous after all.

One other item of interest relating to tonight's game - if you haven't heard already, one of the secondary spectacles at the games this year has been watching the size of the 50/50 jackpot grow. The Canada-USA game on New Years Eve saw a total pot of over $187,000, with the winner pocketing a tax-free $93,525 share. There have been several other winners pots in excess of $30,000 to $40,000 as well. With all the excitement that goes with a gold medal final, I would expect tonight's take to top $200,000, so over $100k to the winner. Pretty nice little souvenir from the game if you ask me.....