In the spirit of the NHL announcing quarter-century teams for each of its 30 franchises that have played since 2000, I thought I’d try a similar exercise by country – first and second teams. It’s not limited to NHL performance, although that carries a lot of weight. International play for the country also weighs heavily. To be eligible, a player needn’t have necessarily played for the country at a major tournament, but he had (or has) to be eligible.
Countries chosen have to have played in at least four major international tournaments (Olympic games, top-division IIHF World Championships or World Cups of Hockey) since 2000. Based on that arbitrary number, 20 countries qualify. Great Britain barely makes the cut with four top-level World Championships, while Hungary with three, South Korea and Poland each with two, and China with one do not.
I’m revealing them alphabetically starting with Austria, although the four teams in the 4 Nations Face-Off will be held back until the end, just before the start of the tournament. Scroll down for links to other teams published so far.
GERMANY
First Team
F: Leon Draisaitl
F: Marco Sturm
F: Jochen Hecht
D: Moritz Seider
D: Christian Ehrhoff
G: Olaf Kolzig
Second Team
F: Tim Stützle
F: Dominik Kahun
F: J.J. Peterka
D: Dennis Seidenberg
D: Moritz Müller
G: Philipp Grubauer
As the greatest generation of German hockey players ever is starting to come of age, it’s no surprise that seven of the 12 names on these teams are active. I picked all seven of those players to be on next year’s Olympic team – which will be, talent-wise, better than any German hockey team that’s ever played to this point.
Some obvious picks here, with some of the biggest question marks being who should be on the first team and who on the second. Is Stützle’s body of work enough to bump either Hecht or Sturm off the first team? If not, then should Seider also be knocked down to the second team with Seidenberg taking his place? Should Lukas Reichel have made it ahead of somebody?
I wasn’t initially expecting to pick Kolzig, who retired in 2009, as the first-team goalie. But although the South-African-born, Canadian-raised goalie didn’t often play for the German national team, no German goalie has come close to matching his NHL performance – not Grubauer or Thomas Greiss, who was also considered. Matthias Niederberger has played well for Germany internationally but when Grubauer has been available, he usually gets the starting job.
Agree or disagree with the selections? Comment below and check back daily as more international quarter-century teams are revealed.