Posted by Dean McAmmond on December 21, 2007

I was fortunate to get the chance to play for Canada at the 1993 world junior hockey championship in Sweden. Being able to represent your country was a pretty cool thing, looking back at it now. It’s a different feeling. You’re always competing against Canadian guys in your junior hockey league, and now you’re competing with them. That was pretty cool, too.

At the beginning of the year, I remember Sweden beat us 8-3 in an exhibition game and Peter Forsberg didn’t even play for them. But we ended up beating them when it counted in the tournament and winning a gold medal. Back then, it was the best record after seven games that determined who won the gold, and we ended up with the best record. They didn’t have the playoff format they use now. We had to beat Japan to have the best record. It was kind of anti-climactic, but that’s how it went.

Christmas, of course, is the focal point for a lot of people at this time of the year. But it isn’t the focal point when you’re in that situation. The focal point is playing hockey. And you have a bunch of guys together and you usually do your own Christmas thing. You have a little celebration there. The team doctor at that time dressed up as Santa Claus at our little Christmas party, and we celebrated together. We were in a small Swedish town, it was kind of a like a ski resort. They had an ice rink where we practised and we had little cabins that we stayed in. That’s where we celebrated, and then we went to Gavle for the tournament.

Winning that gold medal was special. They went on to win five golds in a row, and we were the team to start that. It’s always fun when you win, right? I had a chance to play with some good players there – Paul Kariya, Chris Pronger and the likes of those guys.
It’s also a special thing for a kid, especially a Canadian kid, to wear that jersey. I’ve done it a couple times since then at the world championships. That’s pretty neat, too, but it’s a little bit of a different thing.

Posted by Dean McAmmond on December 7, 2007

We've been away for a week now, first in Florida and now in Dallas. It's not a bad tradeoff to be on the road for a week, to be in a place that's nice and warm. It makes it kind of enjoyable to be outside and enjoy the sunshine for a bit. We had a chance to do a bit of golf one day, so that was nice. It definitely makes the trip seem a little shorter.

Long trips like this have their good and bad sides. Being out here is kind of nice. That sunshine, I'll bring it up again. But at times, it can be a little tough for me because of being away from my family. My wife and kids at home, you miss them. Sometimes, there can be some long days when you're away from them for awhile.

You're kind of busy on the road, but then you get some down time. Sometimes, you really can't do too much to fill that down time. You're kind of just sitting around at times. After strolling the mall once or twice, it kind of grows old. It's not as extravagant as it might sound, flying from city to city. The best part of being on the road is spending time with the guys, seeing the sights a little bit, enjoying the weather on a trip like this. It's just a chance to get away and be with the guys, have some dinners and that sort of thing.

The road was tougher when I played in the Western Conference. When we were travelling charter in Edmonton, it seemed like every trip was bad. It was just the sign of the times at that point. You wore a suit and tie on the airplane, and you were sitting in Salt Lake waiting for your connection to get into Calgary to connect into Edmonton. It was a lot of time in the airport, a lot of wasted, wasted time. Those weren't enjoyable trips.

I see these guys don't have a routine for the week-long trips. When I was out west, we'd usually go for dinner one night or go to a movie on another night because we were on the road so much. Game days were a wash because we couldn't do anything. Here, it's not much of a routine, other than catch the odd movie here and there or stroll the mall here and there. A lot of these guys love shopping. I don't know what's wrong with them.

Chicago is probably my favourite city to visit. We stay downtown and there's so many nice restaurants downtown and so many stores right on the Magnificent Mile. I don't remember much about travelling to Ottawa earlier in my career, other than we stayed at the Chateau Laurier. We would just find dinner somewhere and that would be it. Although I remember the one time, when I was with the Blackhawks, my wife went into labour with our now seven-year-old, so that was kind of an eventful trip. I was just trying to find a way to fly out of here to get back to Chicago. I remember another time when I smashed my nose and had a cast all over my face, so that was a memorable trip to Ottawa. But I don't remember much about any of the other things we used to do here.