Junior Team Canada: NHL sanctions expected soon

A month ago, journalist Andy Strickland dropped a bombshell by mentioning that the NHL would “soon” be cracking down with major sanctions on five players implicated in the 2018 Junior Team Canada scandal. Strickland indicated that there were some important players among them, and Frank Seravalli pointed out that the list of players who relayed a statement pleading their innocence should not necessarily be trusted.

Then, a week and a half ago, it was a matter of days, according to Martin Leclerc’s sources.

Now, September has just begun, and the sanctions have still not been announced.

Understandably, the situation is extremely delicate, legally speaking. By suspending these five players, the NHL is unwittingly revealing their involvement in the scandal. An involvement that theoretically would not be revealed to the general public, were it not for a professional field hockey league that must crack down. Are we waiting for any authorizations?

We can, however, confidently expect action in the next two weeks. If five players are guilty, it’s only logical that the NHL would want to keep them out of their team’s training camp at all costs. And it also makes sense that the NHL wouldn’t want to make headlines over the summer with this issue, when they could cover it up with all their teams back on the ice. The stars could therefore align in mid-September, if we follow the logic.

Training camps open in two weeks. Most teams will play their rookie tournaments in a week and a half, before opening their official camps around September 21.

The survey has been complete since June. If the league isn’t prepared to deliver the results and penalize the offending players within the next two weeks, we’ll have to ask ourselves some serious questions about this process.

Here, as a reminder, is the list of players from the 2018 edition of Team Canada Junior who do not currently have an NHL contract:

• Maxime Comtois – no contract
• Cal Foote – no contract
• Jonah Gadjovich – LAH contract only
• Alex Formenton – not in the NHL for a year

Formenton has yet to comment on the situation.

We can expect a very complicated and delicate conclusion soon… But then again, we’ve been waiting for it for a while.

In a gust

– A little souvenir from Nick to keep us waiting.

– Alouettes coach takes credit.

– Quarter-finals for Leylah.