Armstrong, who is also the GM of the St. Louis Blues, said he's been in frequent discussion with his Olympic assistant GMs, Ken Holland (Edmonton Oilers), Don Sweeney (Boston Bruins), Ron Francis (Seattle Kraken) and Roberto Luongo (Florida Panthers), as well as the coaching staff, led by Jon Cooper (Tampa Bay Lightning) and assistants Bruce Cassidy (Bruins), Peter DeBoer (Vegas Golden Knights) and Barry Trotz (New York Islanders).
"What we've done is we've projected out our rosters individually, and then you see the synergy," Armstrong said. "If [four] coaches and five managers have the same guys, they're probably going to make the team."
The key, Armstrong said, is configuring the roster in a way that supports how the coaching staff wants to play.
"It really comes down to sitting with the coaches and finding out how they construct their lines, what kind of players they want," he said. "When you have the people that everyone has the same ... it's not just the top point getters. You have to make a team. So you really want to work with the coaches and how they want to make a team, and then synergy between players."
Armstrong was at Wells Fargo Center on Thursday to watch Cooper and the Lightning win 4-3 in a shootout against the Philadelphia Flyers but wouldn't say if he planned on speaking with Cooper after the game.
"I talk to him about two or three times a week now, so I don't have to see him face to face," Armstrong said.
The next step for Armstrong and his group is trimming the 55-player list submitted by Hockey Canada in October to what he called "a workable number" for final evaluation. Pittsburgh Penguins center Sidney Crosby, Edmonton Oilers center Connor McDavid and Vegas Golden Knights defenseman Alex Pietrangelo already have been named to the team.
"I would say by early December you want to be down to that final scope of guys so you can really hone into that group," he said.
The management and coaching staff have met monthly since the start of the NHL season, and Armstrong said he has been impressed by what Luongo has brought to the group.
Luongo, who played 19 NHL seasons as a goalie before retiring in 2019, represented Canada at the Olympics three times during his playing career (2006, 2010, 2014). Currently, he is special advisor to Panthers GM Bill Zito and also oversees Florida's goaltending excellence department.
"He's got that been there, done that experience that he can relate to today's players with," Armstrong said. "Obviously, our management group is a little bit older than that [player] group, so Roberto knows a lot of those guys from inside the room. Plus, I think he's going to be a huge asset when we get to China, too, just having that familiarly with the players. So he's been really good. We've obviously tapped into his goaltending knowledge, but his overall hockey knowledge is outstanding, too."
Canada's monthly meetings will shift to weekly next month, with the goal of selecting the team by the first or second week of January.
The Olympic hockey tournament is scheduled for Feb. 9-19.
"We make a list and then the next couple weeks we'll make another list," Armstrong said. "I'd say there's probably 80 or 90 percent of the guys that have been on all of them. I don't really want to share that number quite yet, but there's certain players that I think everyone (on the outside) has on the list, and we'd probably fall into that group of having them also."
