Let's burn some time while waiting for the puck to drop on the annual extravaganza that is the
2009 IIHF World Junior Championships.
These types of articles are always interesting.
Meet your 2008 Canadian junior team
Tyler Ennis
Hometown: Edmonton
Date of birth: Oct. 6, 1989
Vital statistics: 5-8, 165 pounds
Shoots: Left
2008-09 team: Medicine Hat (WHL)
NHL draft: Buffalo, 2008 (first, 26th)
What you need to know: He went undrafted in 2004 WHL Bantam Draft before being listed by the Medicine Hat Tigers. The most embarrassing song on his iPod is mmmBop by Hanson. His favourite video game is Guitar Hero.
I'm not entirely sure how much time Ennis has had to rock out on Guitar Hero. At the combine and draft in June...at the Sabres Development Camp in July, then off to Ottawa for the Canadian Evaluation Camp...to Medicine Hat in August, then back to Buffalo's camp in September. Reasonably tired, it took him a little while to get clicking in the WHL, before heading back to Ottawa a couple of weeks ago where he's remained with Team Canada. We're thinking he's gotten more use out of his iPod.
We'll cut the dazzler some slack for Hanson given that most iPods these days will hold in excess in 800 songs or more, and because anyone who has seen
Slap Shot can tell you that Hanson is a great hockey name. Heck, I know for a fact that a scan of my own gadget will generate a swift defense of how a song landed there. Remember, Anne Murray is from Canada, and so is hockey...
Tyler Myers
Hometown: Calgary
Date of birth: Feb. 1, 1990
Vital statistics: 6-7, 213 pounds
Shoots: Right
2008-09 team: Kelowna (WHL)
NHL draft: Buffalo, 2008 (first, 12th)
What you need to know: He won a bronze medal with Team Alberta at the 2007 Canada Winter Games. His father, Paul Myers III, played for Lehigh University, and his grandfather, Paul Myers II, played for Colgate University.
Nothing too revealing here, but Upstate New Yorkers can make another slight connection with Myers. Colgate, a small ECAC school in central New York, has produced current NHL players Andy MacDonald, Jesse Winchester, and Cory Murphy, as well as a former goalie who yours truly used to regularly burn while breaking windows in the family breezeway.
Myers was born the day after the Sabres defeated Michel Bergeron's last-place Quebec Nordiques on back-to-back nights, 5-2 and 6-3.
Buffalo made the 12th pick in the draft only once before. That came in 1973 when they selected Morris Titanic out of Sudbury in the OHA. Titanic, who also played with the Niagara Falls Flyers in the O, played 19 games over parts of two seasons before moving on to coach NHLers Bob Beers and Todd Krygier with the Buffalo Jr. Sabres in the 1980's.
