The following is a very long winded preface to a very simple question, if you don't feel like reading it all, skip ahead and just answer the question, but if you don't understand or know much about the issue, please read first.

NCAA vs Canadian Major Junior, its a question that plagues many junior aged players, especially those from the United States, many top young talents go on to choose major junior simply because the talent level is higher and it is the quickest route to the NHL (recently Bobby Ryan, Pat Kane, Cam Fowler, Shane McColgan [potential 2011 first overall], John Moore, Jeremy Morin).

NCAA, however, has its advantages, NHL teams can keep drafted players in NCAA to develop for as long as they want, whereas CHL drafted players must sign a contract within two years of being drafted or else the team loses that player's rights. The other advantage NCAA has over CHL is the age of the players, many of the players are 21 or 22 years old, so when you think about it, if the NCAA could keep their own top young players, combined with the older, more developed players, they could compete with the CHL in terms of talent level. And the more top talent they had in the NCAA would mean a better on-ice product, more fans, more drafted players, more media coverage, more endorsements, more money for Hockey USA to spend on player development and minor league programs to further grow hockey in the USA.

So the question is becomes, how do they keep more players in national development programs and NCAA? The answer is simple, keep mimicking other countries... It was widely reported by Canadian media this year at the World Juniors how USA Hockey had borrowed quite a few ideas form Hockey Canada and it helped them to beat us for the gold medal. Well, Sweden has a rule whereby if a player leaves Sweden to play in the CHL, he loses his WJC elegibility. Sweden is one of the best hockey countries in the world, why not take a page out of their book?

Should USA Hockey ban players from playing in the World Juniors if they play in the CHL?

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Shane McColgan sounds like an awesome name, because I said it out loud and then said it like Shane McColgate in my head...

Haha from Manhattan Beach, California no less. Yeah, as you've obviously heard, the 2011 draft is supposed to be pretty shallow and without a legitimate superstar, but there are still a few really good players that are already getting some hype. It should definately make for an interesting draft year to follow, as from four different sources, I've heard four different names who are the "favorite" to go first overall: McColgan and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins from the WHL, Sean Couturier of the QMJHL and Adam Larsson of the Swedish Elite League.

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Last I heard, Adam Larsson was the favoured one to go 1st overall in 2011.

Yea I heard that going into the World Juniors too. I seen him play live twice there. He looked pretty solid. He was on a pairing with Oliver Ekman-Larsson (PHO) as well as both the number one powerplay and penalty-kill units. He didn't really wow me though. I know he is double under-aged but he looked lost and scared against USA's forecheck when he had the puck behind his net. Almost as many of his breakout passes ended up on American sticks as they did friendly ones. To be fair, USA had an immense amount of speed and and an incredible forecheck and he looked much better against Switzerland.

BUT, at the CHL Top Prospects game one of the commentators mentioned a player who "isn't even eligible for this year's game, but is already leading the QMJHL in scoring and is an early favorite to go first overall in 2011". Talking about Couturier.

And long before that, as early as last spring, I had read an article about how the WHL is looking to break the OHL's stronghold on the first overall pick in 2011, with the two early favorites coming from the WHL, Shane McColggan and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins.

Hahaha, Rayzor, I think you know what you need to do... Its time for a 2011 draft thread...

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Getting back on topic, I voted yes, I think USA should ban players from playing in the World Juniors if they jump ship. Keep top local talent local.