Merry Christmas!
With no NHL or international games (that I know of) on today, I figure it would be a good time to look at the "lesser" of the two holiday tournaments. This year's Spengler Cup features 2 KHL teams (SKA St. Petersburg and Spartak Moscow), two Swiss League teams (Geneve-Servette and host HC Davos), Sparta Praha from the Czech league, and Team Canada.
SKA St. Petersburg
Goalies: Mikhail Meyer, Maxim Sokolov, Jakub Stepanek
Defense: Denis Denisov, Johan Fransson, Denis Grebeshkov, Sergey Gusev, Igor Nikitin, Aleksey Petrov, Aleksey Semenov, Grigory Serkin, Vitaly Vishnevskiy, Dmitry Vorobyev
Forwards: Maxim Afinogenov, Evgeny Artyukhin, Sergey Brylin, Anton But, Petr Chaynek, Gleb Klimenko, Leonid Korolev, Artem Kryukov, Alexander Kucheryavenko, Tony Hans Martensson, Konstantin Panov, Maxim Rybin, Dmitry Shitikov, Maxim Sushinskiy, Mattias Weinhandl, Aleksey Yashin
Top Threat: With decent goaltending and some notable players on defense, their offense (led by Aleksey Yashin) should be able to dominate any opponent.
Weakness: Tell the forwards that it's the playoffs. Remember, this is a Yashin-led team.
Spartak Moscow
Goalies: Dominik Hasek, Alexey Yakhin
Defense: Ivan Baranka, Denis Bodrov, Alexander Budkin, Oleg Piganovich, Mikhail Ryazanov, Yakov Seleznev, Dmitry Vishnevsky, Grigory Zheldakov
Forwards: Yevgeny Fedorov, Oleg Gubin, Kirill Knyazev, Yevgeny Lapenkov, Roman Lyuduchin, Jurai Mikush, Branko Radivojevic, Stefan Ruzicka, Alexey Shkotov, Andrei Sidyakin, Alexander Suglobov, Alexander Yunkov, Mikhail Yunkov, Mikhail Zhukov
Top Threat: A few names stand out, but the biggest reason that this team will have at winning it will be goaltender Dominik Hasek. Even in his mid-forties he's still a dominant goalie.
Weakness: It's Hasek, try to get him to do the splits.
Geneve-Servette
Goalies: Ginaluca Mona, Tobias Stephan, Federico Tamo
Defense: Marc-Andre Bergeron, Goran Bezina, Robin Breitbach, John Gobbi, Martin Hohener, Larry Leeger, Jonathan Mercier, Brian Pothier, Daniel Vukovic
Forwards: Eliot Berthron, Jan Cadieux, Florian Conz, Thomas Deruns, Dan Fritsche, John Hennessy, Richard Park, Pierrick Pivron, Flurin Randegger, Christopher Rivera, Daniel Rubin, Tony Salmelainen, Paul Savary, Oliver Setzinger, Jeff Toms, Morris Trachsler, Eric Walsky
Top Threat: On paper, this doesn't look like a strong team. They are currently 8th in the Swiss National League. If they have any strength it would be their offense.
Weakness: Marc-Andre Bergeron is on their defense...'nuff said.
Sparta Praha
Goalies: Thomas Baumle, Tomas Popperle
Defense: Felicien Du Bois, Michal Gulasi, Jan Hanzlik, Patrik Husak, Petr Macholda, Doug O'Brien, Radek Philipp, Jiri Vykoukal
Forwards: Marek Bartanus, Michal Bros, Karel Hromas, Tomas Kurka, Petr Kafka, Tomas Krapov, Jakub Koreis, Ondrej Kratena, Lukas Lunak, Emanuel Peter, Daniel Pribyl, Radek Smolenka, Petr Ton, Yorick Treille, David Vyborny
Top Threat: Just like Geneve-Servette, this team is struggling. Their offense looks like the strongest point on this team.
Weakness: Struggling team, not going to be much of a challenge.
HC Davos
Goalies: Reto Berra, Leonardo Genoni
Defense: Rene Back, Charlie Cook, Beat Forster, Robin Grossmann, Zdenek Kutlak, Tim Ramholt, Lucas Stoop, Alan Tallarini, Jan von Arx
Forwards: Jaroslav Bednar, Paolo Duca, Peter Guggisberg, Mathias Joggi, Josef Marha, Joel Reymondin, Sandro Rizzi, Gregory Sciaroni, Peter Sejna, Janick Steinmann, Petr Sykora, Petr Taticek, Reto von Arx, Dino Wieser, Marc Wieser
Top Threat: Along with being the host of this tournament, they have been a good team this year (2nd in the Swiss National League). On paper they look like a fairly balanced team.
Weakness: Goaltending might be their weak spot.
Team Canada
Goalies: Jeff Drouin-Deslauiers, Tyler Moss
Defense: Brendan Bell, Curtis Brown, Micki Dupont, Joel Kwiatkowski, Cory Murphy, Curtis Murphy, Mark Popovic, Travis Roche, Duvie Westcott
Forwards: Serge Aubin, Mark Bell, Brendan Brooks, Blaine Down, Josh Holden, Mike Iggulden, Martin Kariya, Eric Landry, Yannick Lehoux, Brett McLean, Glen Metropolit, Pascal Pelletier, Domenic Pittis, Jean-Pierre Vigier
Top Threat: Mark Messier. Yes I know he's the coach.
Weakness: (Former) Oilers goalies, a few ex-Leafs, very little time to prepare, lack of interest from back home, et cetera-et cetera.
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