The truth on Phil Kessel and Team USA: They didn’t want him around for the World Cup of Hockey.

Specifically, general manager Dean Lombardi, who has studied Team USA’s historical victory in 1996, didn’t want one of America’s most talented forwards on his team.

Lombardi is all about character, it’s what he believes in. And it’s deep rooted within him. It’s why he has interviewed almost all the pertinent people involved with Team USA ’96 to find out how it was that Ron Wilson’s team came out victorious.

Kessel has had a terrific playoffs in Pittsburgh. He is one of the leading candidates for the Conn Smythe Trophy as the Cup final begins on Monday night. He has probably never played better than he has the past six weeks.

And Lombardi clearly wanted another approach. What’s even more interesting in this is that Brian Burke is Lombardi’s assistant on Team USA. Burke is a longtime advocate of Kessel. And this is a clear snub when the U.S. is adding players like Justin Abdelkader and Derek Stepan and Ryan Callahan but leaving Kessel behind.

Kessel led Team USA in scoring at the Sochi Olympics and led the round-robin portion of the tournament in scoring before he disappeared in the medal round. The U.S. team ended the Games greatly disappointed and many players pointed to Kessel as letting them down.

THIS AND THAT

So, if someone told you in mid-winter or last Wednesday that the Pittsburgh Penguins, led by Bryan Rust and Matt Murray, would play for the Stanley Cup, you would have said what? ... Murray just turned 22, which makes him young, but not that young. Patrick Roy won his first Stanley Cup at 20. Grant Fuhr was 22 when he won his first Cup, as was Cam Ward. Ken Dryden and Martin Brodeur won their first Cups at 23. San Jose’s Martin Jones is young in experience but he’s 26 ... My Stanley Cup pick: San Jose in 6. Now, go make a few bucks betting your money on the Penguins ... When the previous administration of the Maple Leafs decided to invest in Jonathan Quick’s backup in Los Angeles, did they pick the wrong backup? ... So happy to see Joe Thornton on Team Canada for what The Hockey News’ Ken Campbell is calling the World Cash Grab of Hockey. He played his way on to the team. Only question was, would Doug Armstrong and friends add him to the roster ... Worth repeating: My Canada includes P.K. Subban ... Does it matter which way you shoot? To Mike Babcock it matters. The best five-man unit in hockey history — Igor Larionov, Sergei Makarov, Vladimir Krutov, Slava Fetisov and Alexei Kasatonov all shot left ... I don’t have a team, but if I did, Joel Ward could play for it ... One minute to play in Game 7 protecting a one-goal lead and Sidney Crosby was on the bench for the Penguins. Mike Sullivan has some stones ... When Leafs training camp opens, Mike Babcock will be coaching Team Canada, James van Riemsdyk will be with Team USA, Morgan Rielly and Auston Matthews will be with the World Cash Grab young guns, Leo Komarov will be training in Finland, Nikita Zaitsev will be with the Russians and Milan Michalek will be with the Czechs. You wonder how long it will take after the World Cup for NHL teams to get ready for the season?

HEAR AND THERE

The Raptors ended up with 66 wins — 56 regular season, 10 playoff. To put that into perspective, that’s 13 more wins than any Raptors team before it. The previous high was 53. (Vince Carter’s team in 2001.) ... The 20 playoff games the Raps played was second most in Toronto sporting history. Doug Gilmour’s Leafs played 21 in 1993 ... If DeMar DeRozan’s first interest is winning — and that’s what he says — then you can scratch the Los Angeles Lakers from his free agent list. They aren’t winning any time soon ... Rumblings indicate that Bismack Biyombo can command somewhere between $15 million and $18 million a year in free agency. That’s too rich for the Raptors if he wants to chase dollars, even if they find someone silly enough to trade for Terrence Ross ... Not everyone believes it was OK for professional athletes to be out at 2 in the morning to a big game. A former pro football star sent this e-mail along: “If you are out at 2 a.m. in a casino the night before a playoff game, it means you don’t care. It means you play for money and that’s it.” ... The first piece of business for the Raptors should be securing coach Dwane Casey. He has an option year left on his deal. He has earned long-term security ... This is what the Raptors were up against: LeBron James, who has been to the NBA Finals six straight times, has a 21-3 record in Conference final games played at home.

SCENE AND HEARD

The Florida Panthers continue to confuse. In the playoffs, coach Gerard Gallant believed enough in defenceman Erik Gudbranson to play him more than 25 minutes a game. And when the Vancouver Canucks’ season ended, it was thought rookie Jared McCann would need AHL seasoning before returning to the Canucks. So why trade a young defenceman who can play for a centre who is still developing? And why were people in Vancouver so upset about that? ... The concern with Troy Tulowitzki this year and long term: How many games will he miss due to injury? Over the previous four seasons, Tulowitzki has played 392 games, missed 256. Those are Cam Neely-like numbers ... Matt Murray was the 10th goalie taken in the 2012 NHL Draft. The only other one playing, Tampa’s Andrei Vasilevskiy, was a first-round pick. Murray was taken in a third round that included Shayne Gostisbehere, Frederik Andersen, Colton Parayko and the free agent, Jimmy Vesey ... Former Maple Leafs coach Randy Carlyle has interviewed twice for the coaching job in Calgary. The Flames have been in no hurry to name a replacement for Bob Hartley.

AND ANOTHER THING

You watch David Ortiz at the plate and you wonder: Why he is retiring? He has more home runs, RBIs, a higher batting average, on-base average and OPS than Jose Bautista or Edwin Encarnacion, who are looking for long-term big-bucks contracts. One more question: Why pitch to him in a tie game in the ninth inning? ... I had trouble watching Steven Stamkos play in that terrific Game 7 against Pittsburgh. I kept worrying someone was going to hurt him ... When he traded James Reimer to San Jose, Lou Lamoriello said he wanted to see his young goalies play. He has seen them through this difficult Marlies playoff run. What he has probably learned: He may not have an NHL prospect in goal for the Marlies ... I don’t know where I’d rank LeBron James among the greatest athletes I’ve seen up close, but he’s high on the list. From my own personal list of those covered (and those I’ve watched on TV), I would have to include Usain Bolt, Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, Mario Lemieux, Tom Brady, Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, Barry Bonds, Sugar Ray Leonard, and James. For the record, I never covered Muhammad Ali, Sugar Ray Robinson, Willie Mays, Bobby Orr, Wilt Chamberlain, Jim Brown, or Jim Thorpe ... The longer the playoffs go, the more I wonder: How many offside goals did we miss in our lifetime? ... Happy birthday to Carmelo Anthony (32), Nathan Horton (31), Claude Loiselle (53), Jake (the Snake) Roberts (61), Fay Vincent (78) and Jason Allison (41) ... And hey, whatever became of Radek Bonk?

HAPP’S PRICE TAG

Before this season, and maybe after this season, if you tried to put J.A. Happ and David Price in the same sentence, people might think you a tad crazy.

But here we are just days before June and the much maligned signing of Happ in Toronto and the over-hyped signing of Price in Boston has brought two very different left-handed pitchers into vogue.

For two terrific months — and longer if go back to August — Happ has outperformed Price. He has pitched more innings for the Jays this season than Price has pitched for the Red Sox. He has given up 14 fewer earned runs (37-23), had a lower WHIP, a 3.20 earned run average when compared with Price’s 5.34. Each of them has started 10 games.

Other than striking batters out — and we know what Roy Halladay thought of strikeouts — there isn’t anything Price has done better than Happ this campaign.

Happ has never won more than 11 games in a season; Price has won 20, 19 and 18 games in a season. In this season in which the Blue Jays are still searching to find themselves, after so much consternation about Price going to Boston, Happ has been the best of good news stories.

DECISION TIME FOR UJIRI

When the Raptors season ended a year ago it felt like a punch to the gut. Kyle Lowry didn’t exactly give coach Dwane Casey a ringing endorsement after playing terribly against Washington. The Raptors were swept without putting up much of a fight. Everything was in play, the roster, the coaching staff, the players.

Then came the Masai Ujiri decisions. The first was a decision to retain Casey. The first of series of sound determinations by the GM. He then, in no particular order, brought in DeMarre Carroll, Cory Joseph, Luis Scola, Bismack Biyombo and Norman Powell, all of which deepened the roster and strengthened the team.

Now it’s decision time again for Ujiri. It may start, again, with his coach. But he has to juggle pending free agents like DeRozan and Biyombo and lesser profile free agents like Scola and James Johnson. Decide who to sign, how to sign them, and how again to make this Raptors team better.

What do we now? We trust Ujiri to do what’s right. He’s earned that trust.

WHERE WILL MARNER PLAY?

There has to be a certain excitement about what Mitchell Marner is accomplishing at the Memorial Cup. The Leafs draft pick is tearing up the junior championship in a manner which has rarely been seen before.

And now the dilemma.

The Leafs can’t possibly want him playing junior again next season because he has clearly proven he is beyond that level of hockey. So barring unforeseen circumstances at training camp, you would think Marner would start next season with the Leafs.

By rules, they can’t send him to the American Hockey League. By rules, he has to be with the Leafs or his junior team. And this is where things could get interesting. Leafs GM Lamoriello has great understanding of how to manipulate NHL rules if need be. I can foresee a scenario in which Marner is with the Leafs, he plays some games but not every game, he suffers an injury, real or perceived, he needs to be send to the Marlies for a conditioning stint, and then he gets brought back to Toronto to play a few more games.

This is assuming, of course, he’s not ready to step right in. If he isn’t, the Leafs can then send him to the world junior tournament, which is in Toronto and Montreal. There are in place unstated contingency plans for Marner, if he clearly earns a place on the Leafs roster or if they try to bring him along slowly. With Patrick Kane leading the NHL in scoring and Johnny Gaudreau now a top-10 scorer, there is reason to believe Marner can make a difference. It’s a question of when and how, but with Matthews coming to Toronto and William Nylander as well, the talent being accumulated is more than intriguing.

ssimmons@postmedia.com

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