When American colleges go door to door, recruiting teenaged hockey players, they now have bragging rights over the Canadian Hockey League thanks to the United States’ victory in the world junior hockey championship.

“What it demonstrates is how good college hockey is,” says Mike Snee, the executive director of College Hockey Inc. “It speaks to the calibre and quality of play and player in NCAA hockey.”

The American team was loaded with college players as it earned the U.S.’s third gold medal since 2010, the most by any country in that time span. Canada, a team loaded with major junior players since the inception of the tournament, has won one gold medal since 2010.

It’s a point not lost on American recruiters.

“We have a lot of bullet points, and this is one that is huge,” says Snee, whose outfit promotes the U.S. college hockey experience to teenagers.

The hockey world has been waiting for the Americans to arrive. They haven’t done so at the senior level in international tournaments — their lone title in the last 50 years was at the 1996 World Cup — but Olympic glory is probably only a matter of time (and continued NHL participation).

But bubbling beneath the surface — and beyond its vaunted U.S. national development program — is the rise of the U.S. college system as an important cog in developing players.

When the Americans won the world juniors in 2010, they did so with a roster that only slightly favoured players that went to a U.S. college. Twelve were NCAA players, 10 played in major junior. There were no other college players in the tournament.

By 2013, when the Americans won again, the division was more stark: 14 members of their roster played in the NCAA, eight were in major junior. There were two college players on other teams.

And this year, the Americans won with a roster filled with college players: 20 of 23. Perhaps more telling, other countries also drew from the U.S. college system: Finland, Slovakia, Latvia all had players, Canada had two.

There are statistics outside the junior tournament that show U.S. college hockey on the rise.

11 first-round picks in the 2016 NHL draft were either from an American college or on their way to college (up from seven in 2015, three in 2014, and zero in 2013).

More than half of the Pittsburgh Penguins roster that won the Stanley Cup in 2016 was comprised of former college players.

Three of the top six teams in the NHL standings this season — the Penguins, the New York Rangers and the Minnesota Wild — have the most former college players.

There has always been a divide over the best route for a young player. It often comes down to individual taste.

“Kudos to Team USA,” said David Branch, the CHL commissioner. “As a development system, we’re a shootout away. When you look at it all together, we had 55 players in the tournament and six of the team’s captains play in the CHL.

“We develop players like no other league.”

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The CHL offers an intense, NHL-like schedule in a pro-team atmosphere. The U.S. college system emphasizes more ice time through practice and a season of about 40 games (while hockey players graduate with a degree 92 per cent of the time).

“Is there anybody out there who doubts the NCAA is great hockey?” Snee asks. “You can get offended when somebody suggests the NCAA is either a good Plan B, or great for the late bloomer, or good if you’re undersized. It’s good for all those people.

“But it’s also darned good for the Jonathan Toews, Jack Eichels, and so on.”