Seth Jarvis is taking a philosophical approach to not being named to Team Canada.
After the initial 25-man roster for the Olympic Winter Games was released on Wednesday, the Carolina Hurricanes centre was unsurprisingly disappointed not to have made the cut, but he's taking it in stride.
"Saw a quote a few years ago: 'Sometimes you've got to eat a s--- sandwich. You chew on it a little bit, it doesn't taste very good, but you move on,'" Jarvis said on Thursday after morning skate, quoting former Canes forward Justin Williams. "Weirdly enough, that kind of resonated with me."
Jarvis had previously made the roster for the 4 Nations Face-Off, tallying one assist in three games while playing an average of 11:40 of ice-time a night.
However, his previous contributions in red and white weren't enough to get him onto the Olympic roster, instead ceding spots to newcomers like Macklin Celebrini, Tom Wilson, Bo Horvat and Nick Suzuki.
"Obviously, it's something I really worked for and watched to achieve, but there's nothing you can do about it now," Jarvis said to Hurricanes writer Walt Ruff. "I gave myself a couple of days to take it in, feel emotions, and now it's just move past it and get ready for the season."
The 23-year-old has had a solid fifth season in Carolina, registering 19 goals and 10 assists in 34 games while averaging 19:04 of ice time a night.
He's remained one of the better two-way centres in the league, picking up 13 blocked shots and throwing 43 hits while contributing on the penalty kill with two shorthanded goals.
While he was left off the initial 25-man roster, Jarvis did confirm to reporters that he was asked to be a standby player should someone get injured or be unable to suit up for the Winter Olympics.
On Wednesday, when the roster was revealed by Hockey Canada, general manager Doug Armstrong said that the program is keeping a "long, but not too long" group of standby players, and that players would be asked to come in depending on what sort of player is ruled out.
"What we've tried to do is — just to give you an insight into our thought process — is that it's not 'one player out, one player in,'" Armstrong said when asked about the team's standby list. "What we're going to do is say, 'If this style of player gets hurt, we'll have a list of players to look at. If this style of player gets hurt, we'll have a list of players to look at.'"
