By Andrew Phillip Chernoff | CanucksBanter

December 26th, 2024

2025 World Junior Championship Day 1 – 411 by Andrew Podnieks @ iihf.com

• The World Junior Championship is coming to Canada for the 16th time, and the second time to Ottawa
• The last time the Juniors came to Ottawa was 2009, when fans set a record by passing through the turnstiles 453,282 times in 31 games, an average of 14,622 a game (also a record).
• This year begins a string of three World Juniors in a row in North America:
  • Next year will be hosted by USA Hockey, at St. Paul and Minneapolis, Minnesota
  • The year after will be back under the auspices of Hockey Canada, in Alberta (location(s) TBD).
• Kazakhstan earned promotion last year and will be playing at the World Juniors for the ninth time, and the first since 2020.
  • Only five countries have played in every U20—Canada, Czechia/Czechoslovakia, Finland, Sweden, United States. 
• Canada is tops in several all-time categories.
  • They lead the medal haul, having won 35 in the previous 48 events (20G, 10S, 5B)
  • No country has scored more goals than Canada’s total of 1,637 in 314 games.
  • Their 231 victories is also tops, followed by Sweden (198), Finland (176), and the United States (175). 
• Two Slovaks will also break—or, tie—a record.
  • Both Dalibor Dvorsky and Maxim Strbak will be playing in their FIFTH World Juniors! But there’s a catch.
    • Their first U20 was the ill-fated event of December 2021 that was cancelled because of a covid-19 outbreak.
    • They both played two games of that tournament, then played in 2022, 2023, and 2024, and should tie the official record of four tournaments in their first game in Ottawa.
    • However, because the team never advanced past the quarter-finals in this span, they won’t approach the record for most games played (26, Bjorn Christen, SUI). They both sit at 16 games played.
• Czechia’s Eduard Sale will also try to make his way into the record books.
  • He will be playing in his third straight U20, and he has already won a silver medal in 2023 and bronze last year. Another medal in Ottawa would tie him for most in a career.
  • Indeed, some 28 players have won three medals at the World Juniors, but at the top of the heap stands Canada’s Jason Botterill, the only player to have won three gold.
• Two Americans also have a pretty special resume that they hope to add to in the next two weeks.
  • Gabe Perreault and Zeev Buium won gold at the U18 in 2023 and gold at last year’s World Juniors. Only seven times has a team won U18 one year and U20 the next, so the list of back-to-back gold medallists is small.
  • To win three combined gold medals at the junior level (U20 + U18) is also a small and exclusive list (last achieved by Canadian Connor Bedard and achieved by only five Americans—goalie Jack Campbell, and skaters Seth Jones, Jacob Trouba, Jason Zucker, and Rocco Grimaldi).
• In the crease, the goalie to watch is another American Trey Augustine, who could add his name to the record book on several counts.
  • Still only 19, he will be playing in his sixth tournament and record-tying third World Juniors for the Americans.
  • He has a gold medal from last year and a bronze from 2023, so a medal in Ottawa would tie the record of three medals for a goalie at the U20.
  • And if that third medal were to be gold, he would join an exclusive group of five other goalies with two career golds.