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By John HughesSlate Journal sports reporterMention the name Dave King to University of North Dakota hockey Coach Gino Gasparini and you darken his day considerably.King is the man charged with making Canada’s Olympic hockey team respectable in time for the Games of 1988 to be held in Calgary. In that position he has decided he will put together a team early — next August to be exact — so that he has time to whip it into the kind of shape necessary to whip up on the rest of the world.King has gotten Gasparini’s attention, as well as that of other United States college coaches — Wisconsin’s Jeff Sauer included — by raiding their rosters.So far, King said he has made offers to six players in U.S. colleges. Wisconsin’s Scott Mellanby is one. Peter Douris of New Hampshire, and four Sioux — Perry Berezan, Bob Joyce, Brad Berry and Tony Hrkac — are the others.A player who decides to join King’s national team will get a scholarship to the University of Calgary, in addition to a “training allowance” of something like $6,000 a year. He willplay a schedule of games against professional teams (National Hockey League teams in their preseason; International Hockey League teams later) and college teams. He will go to Europe at least three times during the season for international competition.The Canadian government is paying for the scholarships and three corporate sponsors — Labatt’s Brewery, Continental Bank and Imperial Oil — have offered additional financial support.King said he has given the players guarantees that they will remain with the team for two or three years, depending upon their age and ability. Mellanby’s guarantee is for three years.“Does he guarantee that they will make the Olympic team?” Sauer asked.No.“They have to make the actual roster of 20 in ’88,” said King this week by telephone from his Calgary office.He added, however, that he has not made his offers on a whim. The initial six are all top-shelf candidates in his opinion.“We’ve identified players, like Scott, that we think are going to beWWfA'•'**'/■'-VC'.*'excellent hockey players,” King said. “The players that we are really serious about are getting two- and three-year guarantees with the national team. There are some players getting only one-year guarantees with us.”The American coaches remain unconvinced.“I don’t see how anyone can guarantee anything for the next three years,” Gasparini groused. “I can’t even guarantee a guy he’ll play in a month’s time.“There’s too much in the gray area that could put somebody’s career in• *wlt;1 .‘We’ve players,identifiedScott (Mellanby, left), that we think are going to be excellent hockey players. The players that we are really serious about are gettingtwo-andthree-yearguarantees with the national team.'Canada’s Dave Kingjeopardy,” Gasparini said. “The Olympics are in ’88. Somebody staying where he is won’t change his opportunity.”King agreed.“If a player decides he doesn’t want to join us this year, we aren’t going to blackball him,” he said. “It’s just that we feel it’s very important for us to become the first party to a lot of these young players. Right now, there’s the club he’s playing with, there’s the National Hockey League team that’s drafted him, and then we’re third in line. We feel we lose toomany players that way.“People wonder what will happen to these kids if the Olympics are opened to professionals before ’88,” he said. “We feel strongly that if we recruit the best young players right now, they will be better than most of those professional players that might be offered to us in ’88. The NHL is notgoing to give up its best players.”There are other potential snags, however. As Sauer pointed out, if a player leaves, then decides in a year that he doesn’t like the Canadian national program, he is not free to rejoin his college team without obeying the National Collegiate Athletic Association tranfer rules. He is, in essence, closing the door on his college career.King also sympathizes with the coaches who have to recruit to replace their lost players. “A lot of the players don’t want to give us an answer until the conclusion of their season, so it puts the coach into a bind as far as who to recruit,” he said.Some ill will is inevitable. Minne-sota-Duluth Coach Mike Sertich said he will not have the Canadian national team on any of his future schedules.“Why should I put money in his pocketbook?” Sertich said. “That’slike running off with somebody else’s wife and then asking if you can usehis car.”That’s gallows humor from a coach who fears losing players like Rick Kosti, Norm Maclver and Bill Watson.Gasparini said King is “eliminating alternatives” from the players. To the contrary, King said, he is offering them one more alternative.The reward — Olympic glory — is an attractive one, indeed, as proved by all the players who have stepped directly from past Games into the NHL with ready-made names and fat contracts.King has put his proposal on the table for the players to accept or reject.“We’re not trying to fool anybody,” he said. “If the player doesn’t think it’s a strong enough option for him to consider; if there are too many loopholes for him, fine. Then he shouldn’t consider it.”Calling three years in advance is what makes the decision tough. Is there a 15-year-old right wing in Moose Jaw or Thunder Bay who in three years will make Scott Mellanby expendable ?Scott Mellanby has to decide that.
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