The rosters for September's World Cup of Hockey were finally finalized yesterday, with 173 National Hockey League players named to the eight teams. Some eyebrows were raised, though, by the small number of Calgary Flames players named to the competition.
Top-six forwards Johnny Gaudreau (North America), Sean Monahan (North America) and Michael Frolik (Czech Republic) are headed to the World Cup, along with blueliner Jyrki Jokipakka (Finland) and pending unrestricted free agent Jakub Nakladal (Czech Republic). Not headed to the tournament, at least for now, are everybody else on the Flames roster including the three best defensemen (Mark Giordano, T.