Don't blow it," a redf aced man in full hockey equipment and a white Canada jersey bellowed at Steve Yzerman.

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Steve Yzerman is shaping the Canadian men's hockey team.

Photograph by : Getty

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"Don't blow it. Gotta win. Don't come home."

From Vancouver, that is. Don't come home from the 2010 Winter Olympics without the gold medal. That was the bellowing man's message for Yzerman, the executive director of the Canadian men's hockey team.

The bellower was Canadian comic Sean Cullen and he was only kidding around with Yzerman. Well, kind of kidding around. Cullen had been enlisted to entertain the crowd and promote Molson Canadian Hockey House -- a hospitality and entertainment venue planned for the Vancouver Games -- at a Hockey Hall of Fame event yesterday.

Yzerman was there, too -- not to generate any laughs but to give a short speech and later talk about a subject he cannot seem to shake.

Everywhere Yzerman goes, people want answers to the same questions: What is going on with the Olympic team? Who is going to make the final cut? Does young sniper Steve Stamkos have a chance? And what about the starting goaltender, will it be Martin Brodeur or Roberto Luongo?

The questions never cease, even when no one else is around to ask them. Yzerman keeps asking himself the same things.

"It is something I think about, constantly, every single day," he says. "My wife will ask me, 'What is on your mind?' And usually it is, like ... you get consumed by it, that is the way I find myself. The last few days here at the Hockey Hall of Fame have been a bit of a distraction, but now it is back to work."

For Yzerman, the work is getting complicated. Fortysix players were invited to Canada's Olympic orientation camp last summer. Some, such as Ryan Smyth, a longtime international foot soldier for Canada, were perceived as courtesy invites. The player known as Captain Canada now has 20 points in 18 games with the surprising Los Angeles Kings, and is presumably one of the questions uppermost in Yzerman's mind.

Another is Los Angeles Kings defenceman Drew Doughty. Doughty was also invited to the summer camp. Not as a courtesy, but to get some experience rubbing elbow pads with the likes of Scott Niedermayer and Chris Pronger. The 19-year-old is currently outscoring his two elders and is second to Dan Boyle among Canadian defencemen with three goals and 15 points.

Stamkos, meanwhile, was not among the summer invitees. But the Tampa Bay Lightning sophomore leads all Canadians, including struggling teammate Vincent Lecavalier, with 12 goals in 15 games.

"I am not going to hold it against a player simply because he is young," Yzerman said. "But in most cases there are several players, in most places, that have been through these events and have played well so far, and that make it likely that we will be going with veteran guys."

The names on Yzerman's master list are written in pencil. He has a good idea of what he wants his team to look like, yet the grand unveiling of Canada's 23-man Olympic roster is not until New Year's Eve. Even after that date, the roster could be impacted by injuries.

"You can't help but pick a roster that people are going to debate, there are so many players to choose from, but I am not looking to outsmart Canada here," Yzerman says, laughing. "But there are players that I perceive to be very, very good, and are maybe not as high profile as some others."

Yzerman's profile is immense right now, and the responsibility he has been given great. He understands that, and if he did not, there was a rogue comic in the Hall of Fame determined to remind him. Cullen was carting around a case of beer. He offered the Team Canada architect a beverage, which Yzerman politely declined. He is a busy man with a big job to do, after all, and he does not want to blow it.

"We'll get to [the beer] later," Yzerman said. "I got work to do."

joconnor@nationalpost.com