Jacob Fowler roughed up in his first game at Team USA’s summer camp

At the last draft, we knew that the Canadiens wanted to replenish their bank of prospects in front of the net. To do so, it drafted no less than three goaltenders, including American Jacob Fowler at the start of the third round.

Fowler almost immediately became the club's top prospect in net. He just dominated the USHL last year, and if he has a good rookie year in the NCAA, he'll be among the circuit's top prospects in net.

And he's got a chance to earn points this summer, when he's at Team USA's summer camp in preparation for the WJC in the winter. There, he has the opportunity to earn points, and in my opinion, he has a serious chance of making the club.

In fact, today was the first match for Team USA Blue, the group of which he is a member. Lane Hutson is part of Team USA White, meanwhile.

The problem is that, in the half-match he was given, he really took a beating from the Swedish team. After seeing his assistant Andrew Oke concede three goals from 12 shots, he was hoping to get his club back on track in the second half.

However, the opposite was true: he was soon the victim of bad luck, as a whimsical rebound allowed Otto Stenberg to score against him.

But clearly, it wasn't a great day for the American team, who really saw the Swedish outfit go over their heads.

And while part of Fowler's performance was due to the poor support he received, he was also caught out of position on more than one occasion. On the Swedes' fifth goal (the second he allowed), this was the case, for example.

In the end, Fowler allowed two more goals in the third. He thus ended his day's work by giving up four goals, having faced 16 shots.

An efficiency rate of 0.750 is nothing to sneeze at.

It's still far too early to panic, though: we're talking about a mere half-game in a summer camp. Fowler will have plenty of other opportunities to prove his worth to the U.S. team, and could be back in net as early as Monday, this time against Finland.

Now it's up to him to bounce back.

In bursts

– Lane Hutson will also be in action today.

– News from the Xhekaj brothers.

Hey Arber & Florian 👋 pic.twitter.com/or2RrtMVOP

– /r/Habs (@HabsOnReddit) July 29, 2023

– I'm going with Barkov, McDavid, Slavin and Pulock, personally.

– Tough break for the Jays.