Team Canada Sochi 2014: Don’t give Luongo No. 1 job just yet

Team Canada Mike Babcock has more than enough talent to work with on the 2014 Winter Olympic hockey squad, but the club’s biggest decision will likely come down to which goaltender the team will ride throughout the tournament. This winter it will come down to Roberto Luongo, Carey Price, Corey Crawford, Mike Smith and Braden Holtby.

Right now, the 34-year-old Luongo is probably at the top of the mountain. He won all five games he played for Team Canada in the gold medal run at the Vanouver Winter Olympics. Luongo had a 1.75 goals-against average in that tournament with a sparkling .927 save percentage.

But things have changed a lot since then, haven’t they? Luongo spent more than 18 months waiting for the Vancouver Canucks to trade him and his massive contract so they could hand the crease to Cory Schneider. That didn’t happen. So Luongo sat around and tried to be a good “team guy.” Now, barring yet another twist in the story, he’ll be back in Vancouver for training camp as the No. 1 guy again after Schneider was traded to New Jersey.

We can assume Luongo will be a class act again this fall – especially with the Olympics looming – but there’s really no way to know how this situation will play out in Vancouver. The Canucks now have John Tortorella on the bench and who knows how the team will react to his personality and his systems? The Canucks could go through a significant adjustment period at the very least. How will that impact Luongo after all he’s already gone through with this organization?

That’s why this Team Canada goaltending competition needs to be an open competition with each netminder starting from ground zero. The issue is each of these goaltenders have their own question marks.

Price was on a tremendous roll with the Habs until the wheels completely fell off down the stretch. Now there’s a lot of talk he isn’t happy in Montreal and some wonder about his practice habits. Team Canada, tournament co-favorites with Russia, needs consistency and dependability. Right now, people wonder whether Price can handle the pressure and that’s a fair point.

Mike Smith is an interesting option. He backstopped Canada in the 2013 IIHF World Championships and has been the backbone of Phoenix Coyotes for years. Don’t count him out, but he’s coming off knee surgery. Washington’s Braden Holtby certainly has a bright future, but he isn’t ready for the Olympic stage yet.

Corey Crawford might be the real darkhorse here. Everyone was down on him after the Chicago Blackhawks flopped in the playoffs last season, but he proved his doubters wrong last month by leading them to their Stanley Cup championship.

At this point, it’s a completely wide open race and it’s not one that’s going to be decided before Christmas. Before that, everything is just speculation and there are too many variables involved to start tapping anybody the No. 1 guy.