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Top Line WORLD HOCKEY

by

Randy Steinman
Follow @randy_steinman

Several years ago I stumbled upon a website featuring a fantasy contest called either "Top Line" or "First Line" hockey. The exact name of the contest and the name of the website escape me. Internet searches to find it have proved futile.

The goal of the simply-structured fantasy contest was to assemble a six-player roster consisting of the top three forwards, two defensemen and goalie. Forwards and defensemen garnered points based on their scoring points while goalies were awarded points for wins and shutouts.

Here is the version of "Top Line" World Hockey, based on 2019-20 NHL season stats. To be eligible a country must have had at least three forwards, two defensemen and one goalie who played in the NHL in 2019-20.

Oddly, the leading scorer of 2019-20, Leon Draisaitl of Edmonton is not included in this contest as Germany did not meet the minimum player requirements for each position. Forwards and defensemen are assigned their scoring points from 2019-20 as their points. Goalies get two points for each win and and one point for each shutout. The top six performers form the lineup for each country.

Countries are ranked in order of points in this "Top Line" World Hockey "contest":

1. Canada (442)
2. United States (438)
3. Russia (397)
4. Sweden (343)
5. Finland (317)
6. Czech Republic (296)
7. Slovakia (160)

ROSTERS:

CANADA

Forward: Connor McDavid (EDM) 97/ Nathan MacKinnon (COL) 93/ Brad Marchand (BOS) 87
Defense: Alex Pietrangelo (STL) 52/ Cale Makar (COL) 50
Goal: Jordan Binnington (STL) 30W,3SO 63 pts.

UNITED STATES

Forward: Patrick Kane (CHI) 84/ Auston Matthews (TOR) 80 / Jack Eichel (BUF) 78
Defense: John Carlson (WAS) 75/ Tony D'Angelo (NYR) 53
Goal: Connor Hellebuyck (WPG) 31W,6SO 68 pts.

RUSSIA

Forward: Artemi Panarin (NYR) 95/ Nikita Kucherov (TB) 85/ Evgeni Malkin (PIT) 74
Defense: Ivan Provorov (PHI) 36/ Mikhail SergacheV (TB) 34
Goal: Andrei Vasilevsky (TB) 35W,3SO 73 pts.

SWEDEN

Forward: Mika Zibanejad (NYR) 75/ Elias Petterson (VAN) 66/ William Nylander (TOR) 59
Defense: Victor Hedman (TB) 55/ Erik Karlsson (SJ) 40
Goal: Jacob Markstrom (VAN) 23W,2S0 48 pts.

FINLAND

Forward: Sebastian Aho (CAR) 66/ Patrik Laine (WPG) 63/ Teuvo Teravainen (CAR) 63
Defense: Miro Heiskanen (DAL) 35/ Rasmus Ristolainen (BUF) 33
Goal: Tuukka Rask (BOS) 26W,5S0 57 pts.

CZECH REPUBLIC

Forward: David Pastrnak (BOS) 95/ Jacub Voracek (PHI) 56/ Jacob Vrana (WAS) 46
Defense: Filip Hronek (DET) 31/ Michal Kempny (WAS) 18
Goal: David Rittich (CAL) 24W,2SO 50 pts.

SLOVAKIA

Forward: Tomas Tatar (MTL) 61/ Richard Panik (WAS) 22/ Tomas Jurco (EDM) 2
Defense: Zdeno Chara (BOS) 24/ Erik Cernak (TB) 12
Goal: Jaroslav Halak (BOS) 18W,3SO 39 pts.

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