What is it?

The NJEC is an annual tournament organized by USA Hockey to evaluate their junior team prospects ahead of the coming season. This is their long list for next year's World Junior Championship.

To accomplish this they start with a split squad of USA players, Team White and Team Blue, who play each other. Next, they add in Team Finland and Team Sweden, trim the USA roster to a single team, and finally, Team Canada rolls across the border to join in.

Who is in it?

First off, a note about who isn't. It's common for junior-eligible high draft picks to skip this event. They're busy, they just had development camp, and if they're really high up, they aren't going to the WJC anyway.

Auston Matthews is not there. Neither are Patrik Laine, Jesse Puljujärvi or Olli Juolevi. Pierre-Luc Dubois is on the Team Canada roster. Alex Nylander and a few other Swedes opted out.

Mitch Marner is also on the Team Canada roster leading a list of six Leafs prospects to watch, the full rosters are linked bellow:

Name Team Where to watch this season
Mitch Marner Team Canada The ACC!
Jeremy Bracco Team USA/Team Blue Kitchener Rangers
Joseph Woll Team USA/Team White Boston College
JD Greenway Team USA/Team White University of Wisconsin
Carl Grundström Team Sweden Frölunda
Jesper Lindgren Team Sweden MODO

Team Finland's roster.

There is, of course, no guarantee all three of those Leafs picks on the USA teams will make the cut to the single team.

When?

The live-streamed action begins at 1 p.m. eastern time on Sunday, July 31, with a game between Sweden and USA White.

USA White
USA Blue		 5:00 PM
07/30/16
Sweden
USA White		 1:00 PM
07/31/16
Finland
USA Blue		 4:00 PM
07/31/16
Sweden
USA Blue		 1:00 PM
08/01/16
Finland
USA White		 4:00 PM
08/01/16
Finland
Canada		 1:00 PM
08/03/16
Sweden
Team USA		 4:00 PM
08/03/16
Canada
Sweden		 1:00 PM
08/05/16
Team USA
Finland		 4:00 PM
08/05/16
Sweden
Finland		 4:00 PM
08/06/16
Canada
Team USA		 7:00 PM
08/06/16

Where to watch?

All Team Canada games beginning on August 3, will be broadcast live on TSN. The full schedule is available on their site.

All games beginning Sunday are scheduled to be streamed via Fasthockey. This is a pay site that requires you to have an account set up to even see the schedule. The cost for a single month pass--and remember August starts tomorrow--is $26.99 USD.

UPDATE: USA Hockey announced on Monday, August 1, that some games will be broadcast in the US on the NHL Network.

The exclusive U.S. television coverage will commence on Wednesday (Aug. 3) with two games, including Canada vs. Finland at 1 p.m. ET and USA vs. Sweden at 4 p.m. NHL Network will also carry games on Friday (Sweden vs. Canada at 1 p.m.; USA vs. Finland at 4 p.m.) and Saturday (Sweden vs. Finland at 4 p.m.; USA vs. Canada at 7 p.m.).

Maple Leafs Prospects