Every 4 years, it’s a ritual rite of passage for every Canadian to second guess the Olympic Canadian brass for their picks of the Olympic men’s hockey team.

When the baseline expectation is that Canada will win the gold medal – it does leave a glass empty feeling about who should have made the team and who should have been left off.

Well, at Generation GO – we have not only complied the stats and stated our thoughts on the Yzerman’s first team but also that of our own second and third.

Seeting some of the intangibles aside, the real misses I see are not tapping Washington’s Mike Green vs. the chosen Brent Seabrook,  Brad Richards or Mike Cammalleri vs. the chosen Patrice Bergeron and Dustin Penner vs. Brendan Morrow. However, it’s splitting hairs and even if you did choose differently, at most these players are going to see 12-14 minutes per game if not just sit in the press box.

Based on our rosters below, Canada could easily field three gold medal teams in the Olympics, here are there cumulative year-to-date stats and rosters:

Canada’s Players. G…. A ..PTS..+/-..Shots..GW..Ave Minutes Per Game
Team Canada #1 246 422 668 110 2107 36 22:18
Team Canada #2 199 362 561 94 2063 31 20:55
Team Canada #3 181 309 480 17 1503 20 20:00

Canada’s Goalies W Save% GAA SO
Team Canada #1 66 0.917 2.28 6
Team Canada #2 28 0.900 3.00 4
Team Canada #3 35 0.910 2.74 0

First Lines:
Canada #1
C – Sidney Crosby
RW – Jarome Iginla
LW – Rick Nash

Canada #2
C – Vincent Lecavalier
RW – Martin St. Louis
LW – Brad Richards

Canada #3
C – Danny Briere
RW – Jason Spezza
LW – Ryan Smyth

Second Lines:
Canada #1
C – Ryan Getzlaf
RW – Corey Perry
LW – Eric Staal

Canada #2
C – Marc Savard
RW – Jeff Carter
LW – Mike Cammalleri

Canada #3
C – John Tavares
RW – J.P. Dumont
LW – Simon Gagne

Third Lines:
Canada #1
C – Joe Thornton
RW – Patrick Marleau
LW – Dany Heatley

Canada #2
C – Shane Doan
RW – Jordan Staal
LW – Dustin Penner

Canada #3
C- Travis Zajac
RW – Stephen Weiss
LW – Rene Bourque

Fourth Lines
Canada #1
C – Jonathan Toews
RW – Mike Richards
LW – Brendan Morrow

Canada #2
C – Stephen Stamkos
RW – Mike Fisher
LW – Patrick Sharp

Canada #3
C- Paul Statsny
RW – Brad Boyes
LW – Andrew Brunette

Defence- First Pairings
Canada #1
D – Chris Pronger
D – Shea Weber

Canada #2
D – Mike Green
D – Robyn Regehr

Canada #3
D – Ed Jovanoski
D – Marc Staal

Defence – Second Pairings
Canada #1
D – Scott Niedermayer
D – Dan Boyle

Canada #2
Jay Bouwmeester
Dion Phaneuf

Canada #3
Michael Del Zotto
Dan Hamhuis

Defence – Third Pairings
Canada #1
D – Duncan Keith
D – Brett Seabrook

Canada #2
D – Brian Campbell
D – Stephane Robidas

Canada #3
D – Ian White
D – Braydon Coburn

Alternates
Canada #1
F – Patrice Bergeron
D – Drew Doughty

Canada #2
F – Milan Lukic
D – Rob Blake

Canada #3
F – Jason Arnott
D – Francois Beauchemin

Goalies
Canada #1
G- Martin Brodeur
G- Roberto Luongo
G- Marc-Andre Fleury

Canada #2
G- Cam Ward
G- Steve Mason
G- Marty Turco

Canada #3
G – Carey Price
G – Dwayne Roloson
G – Ray Emery

Coaches
Canada #1
Mike Babcock
Ken Hitchcock
Jacques Lemaire
Lindy Ruff

Canada #2
Joel Quennville
Dave Tippett
Marc Crawford
Bruce Boudreau

Canada #3
Brent Sutter
Dan Bylsma
Alain Vigneault
Barry Trotz

Management
Canada #1
Steve Yzerman
Kevin Lowe
Ken Holland
Doug Armstrong

Canada #2
Mario Lemieux
Doug Wilson
Mike Gillis
Scotty Bowman

Canada #3
Wayne Gretzky
Bob Gainey
Darryl Sutter
Pat Quinn

And yes, we could have done a pretty decent team #4 too.