WWTBAM Bored

This one has me puzzled and I figured there might be a hockey fan here who could enlighten me.

The World Hockey Championships are going on right now and there are eight teams, including the U.S., which has done a massive face plant in the tournament.

U.S.A.
Canada
Russia
Sweden
Finland
Czech Republic
Team Europe
Team North America

Now, team Europe, I understand. It consists of players from countries that aren't in the tournament, and there are certainly enough European players around to make a decent team. But who is on Team North America? Mexico and Jamaica?

Oddly, Team North America finished the round-robin competition with a 2-1 record (but didn't qualify for the semifinals due to a tiebreaker), while team U.S.A. finished 0-3.

silverscreenselect wrote:This one has me puzzled and I figured there might be a hockey fan here who could enlighten me.

The World Hockey Championships are going on right now and there are eight teams, including the U.S., which has done a massive face plant in the tournament.

U.S.A.
Canada
Russia
Sweden
Finland
Czech Republic
Team Europe
Team North America

Now, team Europe, I understand. It consists of players from countries that aren't in the tournament, and there are certainly enough European players around to make a decent team. But who is on Team North America? Mexico and Jamaica?

Oddly, Team North America finished the round-robin competition with a 2-1 record (but didn't qualify for the semifinals due to a tiebreaker), while team U.S.A. finished 0-3.

We were making the same joke up here. But it is comprised of players from Canada and the U.S. aged 23 and under (as opposed to the veteran players on the respective national teams). Needless to say, the national teams did not relish the possibility of losing to a relative bunch of kids (who did alright, I dare say...)

Looks like it's based on age:

The top hockey players from Canada and the United States who are 23 or under as of Oct. 1, 2016, are available for selection exclusively by Team North America.

http://www.espn.com/blog/nhl/post/_/id/ ... th-america


AD beat me to it.

I suspect the "Team North America" concept was a convenient and creative way of having eight teams in the tournament. As noted, "Team Europe" took in the leftovers from that continent (e.g., Switzerland, Germany, and Austria, who have pretty good players, just not enough for a full squad).