12. The IIHF tournament is always a blast – and it was really nice to be part of Team Sweden last season! I think the usual suspects like Canada, Norway, Switzerland, and Czechia will always be factors when it comes to the tournament, but France surprised me the last two seasons, even making it to the finals before being taken down by Sweden. As far as my own player, I would love to play on the team again, but understand there are plenty of up and coming players for Sweden that might not make that possible. I got on as a rookie pick last season, and I have no expectation of being on the team the next time around. Currently, the team has at least 15 players ahead of Violet on the raw TPE list , including a couple of others from her draft class (center SUHS and defender Sundqvist). In the next few seasons I may get lucky as Graj Virrok and M’Baku Olubori regress, but not really before then. I wish there were some options for an intermediate team between the WJC and IIHF, although I also wonder if not being picked for Sweden this year will lead to being moved over to a different team (we’ll see). [208 words, +4 TPE]

14. It was a bit rude for San Francisco to win in the way they did. Couldn’t they at least pretend to make it close? The 14-0 or whatever insane victory they had felt like a blight on the league, but it just seemed like Philadelphia were totally outmatched in all respects – talent, tactics, overall strategy, and mental. The series was very clearly over after the Pride won by a dozen-plus goals or what have you. I’m not sure if Philadelphia could have done anything to change the overall result – it’s hard to overturn a series where you’re at a twenty-something goal deficit overall. We probably should have seen it coming since SFP were like 60 goals ahead in GD compared to the second-place team, and because the top three teams all came from their own conference. I’m almost wondering if San Francisco sandbagged the first game to actually make the series seem fair, as the 2-8 loss they suffered was totally out of character for the remainder of the series. My favorite part of the series if I’m being perfectly honest was when it ended. I was hoping Atlanta would have at least lost to the winner of the championship but knew it was a long shot; the next IIHF tournament being hosted in Philadelphia must have felt like a bittersweet consolation prize for the Forge after that series. [229 words, +4, total +8]