Looking past Olympics, Lindholm's Selke case, and Maurice the savant

The NHL not going to the Beijing Olympics sucks. Flat-out sucks.

Sucks for young players like Connor McDavid and Auston Matthews, who are in their prime. Sucks for older players like Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin, whose careers are starting to wind down. Sucks for fans everywhere. Sucks for the NHL's image. Sucks for the sport, plain and simple.

But we've had a few days to dwell on it. Time to look ahead.

What the NHL and NHL players' association should be turning their collective attention to in the near future is the big picture. Because withdrawing from Beijing was a letdown in a series of letdowns. Hashing out a long-term international calendar is imperative to not only the growth of the sport but also to cultivating tradition beyond the Stanley Cup. And if that means prioritizing the World Cup of Hockey, so be it.

There needs to be a best-on-best international event and, as painful as it is to type this, it's become abundantly clear the Olympics aren't that event in the current climate. (Check back after commissioner Gary Bettman and PA executive director Donald Fehr have retired.) The league and PA can leave the door open for Winter Games participation while satisfying the international hockey itch by targeting non-Olympic years for the World Cup. How about starting a new era in 2023? A second event in 2025? Third in 2027?

Lock it in and get to work on making the World Cup standardized and meaningful. No Team North America. No Team Europe. Leave the gimmicks for All-Star Weekend. The World Cup should be eight of the best hockey countries competing for shiny medals and that strange-looking trophy.

It'll take a few cycles to build up momentum and tradition, of course. But if by 2027 the World Cup is the hockey event worldwide, well, everybody wins.

Doing it properly involves proper timing, too. September didn't quite work in 2016 - the tournament had serious preseason vibes. Try January or February, when the players are in fine form. Yep, it'll require shutting down the season for two or three weeks, but, again, you're investing in building a sustainable future of thrilling international hockey under the NHL/NHLPA banner.

Do it right and, eventually, the Olympics will just be the cherry on top.

Flames' Lindholm for Selke?

Elias Lindholm has received 15 votes for the Selke Trophy over his career - 14 in 2018-19 and one in 2019-20. None of those were for first place.

That may change by season's end.

Lindholm has been fantastic for Calgary through 28 games - a chief reason the Flames are fifth in the Western Conference in points percentage. He's been particularly effective on the defensive side of the puck, and if Selke ballots were due today, I might have the 27-year-old Swede in the No. 1 spot.

Everybody has their own process for evaluating a forward's defensive impact, so the strength of Lindholm's Selke candidacy is far from bulletproof, especially with so much of the season remaining. That said, he checks a lot of boxes.

The Flames are a juggernaut when Lindholm is on the ice at five-on-five. His on-ice goals for and expected goals for rates - 82.8% and 61.0%, respectively, according to Evolving Hockey - are elite. Looking strictly at defense, Calgary's five-on-five numbers with Lindholm are still fabulous - a mere five goals against in 389 minutes and a 2.0 xGA/60 rate.

Some forwards rank higher than Lindholm in certain on-ice metrics, but most of them play sheltered roles or bottom-six minutes against relatively weak competition. Lindholm is incredibly important to the Flames' entire operation; no-nonsense head coach Darryl Sutter leans on him for 20:15 of ice time a night, usually against the opposition's top talent.

Lindholm spends 2:15 a game playing shorthanded. It's not a deal-breaker for Selke consideration if a player doesn't see the ice in penalty-kill situations or while the opponent has its goalie pulled. But it's certainly a huge plus that Lindholm is a key member of the league's third-best penalty kill.

Also of note: Lindholm is solid in the faceoff circle with a 52.5% success rate. He's on the right side in penalty differential (plus-1). And he both steals pucks (20 takeaways) and eats pucks (16 blocked shots) on a regular basis. Anybody who's watched a Sutter-era Flames game knows each player benefits from Sutter's defensive structure and emphasis on responsible hockey. But Lindholm goes above and beyond with his consistent attention to detail.

On top of the defensive work, Lindholm's accumulated 11 goals and 16 assists for 27 points, just shy of a point per game. The definition of the award doesn't require the winner to be competent offensively, but I believe a good offense can be a good defense (and vice versa). In other words, while I don't automatically exclude defensive specialists from the Selke evaluation process, players who crush it in all three zones get bonus marks.

Four others with strong early season Selke cases (according to my personal parameters): four-time winner Patrice Bergeron and Brad Marchand in Boston, Anthony Cirelli in Tampa Bay, and Mark Stone in Vegas.

Paul Maurice, hockey savant

Plenty of digital ink has been spilled over Paul Maurice's resignation. And rightfully so - Maurice is well-respected as both a hockey coach and hockey philosopher. Plus, the timing of the resignation itself was notable.

Let's rewind for a moment ...

It's a decade ago. Rod Brind'Amour has recently transitioned into coaching after a highly successful playing career. Brind'Amour, then just a wide-eyed assistant in Carolina, walks into the coaches' room excited to tell Maurice, his boss, about a tiny detail he'd noticed in a practice or game. You know, something 99.9% of the population would never notice.

Maurice, who was in his second stint as the Hurricanes head coach, simply nods in response. "Damn," Brind'Amour thought to himself, "there's nothing this guy doesn't catch." This happened time and time again.

"There's a shit-ton going on in a game. I mean, so much," Brind'Amour told theScore during an interview in September, recalling the impression left by Maurice. "All the way down to every fine detail, there's a lot, and he doesn't miss any of it."

Back then, Brind'Amour figured this savant-level intelligence was typical of NHL head coaches. He became discouraged and started questioning himself. Was he smart enough to climb the ranks? Could he ever become a head guy?

"I was amazed," Brind'Amour said. "(Maurice) would have four assistant coaches talking to him as he was walking to the locker room, like down the hallway between periods. He'd go, 'What do we need to do? What's the adjustment?' And he'd have four different things thrown his way. 'We've got to do this, this, this, this.' As he's walking in, he'd go, 'OK.' Then he'd get to the front of the room and go, 'Duh, duh, duh, duh.' Everything at once."

Brind'Amour notes he's the opposite now that he's the boss in Carolina. The reigning Jack Adams Award winner needs to know ahead of time exactly what he's going to relay to his players between periods. And then Brind'Amour delivers it in a short burst.

"But he can just spit it all out and make sense of it clearly," he said of Maurice.

"Everybody plays basically the same way," Brind'Amour continued, talking generally about the influence of NHL coaches. "Honestly, there's such subtle differences. That's not where the differences lie. The differences lie in how coaches talk to players and get the most out of their players."

Ultimately, Maurice believed he was no longer able to get the most out of his Jets players. But that doesn't mean the hockey savant can't pull off the trick elsewhere. Maurice will be back soon. Count on it.

Don't sleep on Slovakia

Slovakia could easily lose three of four round-robin games at the world juniors in Alberta over the holidays. After all, they've been placed in a stacked Group B that also features the United States, Sweden, Russia, and Switzerland.

Regardless of the win-loss record, intrigue around the Slovaks will be exceptionally high. Slovakia is icing a handful of legitimate NHL prospects, including LA Kings pick Martin Chromiak and three projected 2022 first-rounders in Simon Nemec, Juraj Slafkovsky, and Filip Mesar.

Nemec, an all-situations right-handed defenseman, could potentially go in the top five next July. (Marian Gaborik, drafted third overall in 2000, is the country's highest NHL draft pick.) Scouts love Nemec's mobility and hockey sense. Named MVP at the Hlinka Gretzky Cup in August, he's excelled in Slovakia's pro league this season, collecting 13 points in 22 games.

Up front, keep an eye out for the big-bodied Slafkovsky and speedy Mesar. Slafkovsky, a potential top-10 pick, is a playmaker who can really shoot the puck. He plays in Finland's Liiga. Mesar, who plays in Slovakia, is smaller in stature but possesses quick hands and feet, and a motor that doesn't quit.

Parting thoughts

Tank update: The 6-21-2 Arizona Coyotes are on pace for just 17 wins. GM Bill Armstrong is reportedly "gauging the market" on Jakob Chychrun. The star defenseman is worth a first-round pick and much more. Incredibly, Arizona already owns three first-rounders and five second-rounders in 2022.

Tage Thompson: From the doghouse to top-line center, what a first 30 games it has been for the giant Buffalo Sabres forward. Thompson has already set career highs in goals (10) and points (18). He might be the most pleasant surprise of the season.

Milestone check: Joe Thornton is two games played away from 1,700, potentially on his way to passing Ron Francis (1,731) and Jaromir Jagr (1,733) for a spot in the top four all time. Sidney Crosby is 10 goals away from 500, a mark only 45 other players have reached. Marc-Andre Fleury is already in the top 15 all time in shutouts, but he's one away from 70.

Further down the career leaderboards, Claude Giroux is one assist away from 600. Nicklas Backstrom is 19 points away from 700. Braden Holtby is six wins away from 300.

Takes, Thoughts, and Trends is theScore's biweekly hockey grab bag.

John Matisz is theScore's senior NHL writer. Follow John on Twitter (@MatiszJohn) or contact him via email ([email protected]).