Preparation trumps skill?

[NyQuil]

Russian goalie stood on his head. If not for Vasya, the game would've been 4-0 Finland.

Good goaltending covers up all manner of sins.

 

[supsens]

Most of these guys are showing up as a cameo. They meet up with old freinds and hang out. It's hard to get a real tourney out of it.

 

[stonec]

Most of these guys are showing up as a cameo. They meet up with old freinds and hang out. It's hard to get a real tourney out of it.

Not the case for European teams at least. Russians are so patriotic that winning or losing with the national team is a matter of life and death, that's why literally every Russian NHL player joins these tournaments and Putin buys them new cars if they win. In Finland ice hockey is the number one sport and there is no more watched TV event than the world championships, if a player underperforms he will be teared apart by the media. Sweden gets all their NHL stars to join and they have a long history with national team success. Czechs and Slovaks are extremely patriotic, they get their A-team to each tournament. Same with Switzerland.

That only leaves the North American teams left. USA usually comes with a more junior team, but they seem to play well together and not lack in effort. Canada has had some tournaments where it seems they were more interested in the host city's night life, but even that is changing and the last three or four tournaments they haven't seemed to lack in motivation.