Canucks prospects Braeden Cootes, Wilson Bj\u00f6rck, and Basile Sansonnens join Canucks Insider Podcast host Chris Faber to discuss representing their countries in this year’s World Juniors Tournament.<\/p>\n
Braeden Cootes<\/p>\n
What has been an incredible past six months for Braeden Cootes from being drafted into the NHL, and playing three games with the Vancouver Canucks, will finish off with him representing Team Canada at the World Juniors Tournament for the very first time in his career.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnytime you get to put on that Canadian jersey, it\u2019s a huge honour. [I\u2019ve] been lucky enough to do it a few times now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Canada\u2019s World Juniors team features the best U20 players in the country, and this year is no different, with several first round and projected first-round picks making the lineup for Canada this year. Getting to play with this level of talent has been very exciting for Cootes thus far.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe practices are awesome,\u201d Cootes said. \u201cYou get to play with the best players, and they\u2019re always the most fun practices I have during the season, especially with the intensity level and how good everyone is. There\u2019s not a bad player on the ice.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s always a huge honour getting to represent your country, and Cootes highlighted the moment he got the call that he would be making the team this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was super excited and honoured. It\u2019s a pretty hard team to get invited into the camp, so it was really cool.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cootes spoke about what Canadians can expect to see from their U20 team this year, recognizing that the past couple of tournaments have not been up to the standards that Canadians and the players have hoped for.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a really good team,\u201d Cootes said. \u201cIt\u2019s pretty insane, the talent level we have. Good forwards, good defence, really good goalies, good coaches, good management, so [I\u2019m] really excited.\u201d<\/p>\n
Canada begins their tournament on Friday and Cootes hopes to be a steady contributor and bring his very best throughout each game of the tournament this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnytime you put on that jersey, you\u2019re bringing your best,\u201d Cootes said. \u201cIt\u2019s a special jersey to wear, [and] there\u2019s a lot of history, a lot of gold medals, [a] lot of championships.\u201d<\/p>\n
Canada will play their first game of the tournament against Czechia at 5:30 p.m P.T.<\/p>\n
Wilson Bj\u00f6rck<\/p>\n
Canucks prospect Wilson Bj\u00f6rck was also drafted just this past June, in the fifth round, and has recently made his debut in North American hockey, where he is currently playing NCAA hockey at Colorado College, an experience he has thrived in thus far.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love every second of it, living with a roommate in a college dorm, living the American dream. It\u2019s been great,\u201d Bj\u00f6rck said. \u201cI love the team, I love the environment in Colorado, so I haven’t really been adjusting very much. I had a great time, so it\u2019s been good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bj\u00f6rck will be representing his home country of Sweden at the tournament this year for the first time, with an added level of excitement on getting to compete alongside his brother, who will also be on the team.<\/p>\n
\u201cWorld Juniors is something you\u2019ve been striving to accomplish and to compete for your country is just amazing. To do that with my brother, it\u2019s incredible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Making a solid impact is something that Bj\u00f6rck hopes to accomplish during this tournament and believes he has the skill set in his game to do so.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs soon as I move my feet, and when I have the puck on the tape, I\u2019m playing my best hockey,\u201d Bj\u00f6rck said. \u201cI\u2019m a guy who wants to make an impact on the game, and I just try to work hard, skate as much as possible, and win puck battles in the corner.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sweden has consistently brought high caliber teams to this tournament, with this year being no different. Bj\u00f6rck has high hopes for the team this year and is confident in their skill and mindset to be successful and win a championship.<\/p>\n
Sweden plays their first game of the tournament on Friday against Slovakia at 10:00 a.m P. T.<\/p>\n
Basile Sansonnens<\/p>\n
Canucks prospect Basile Sansonnens was drafted in the seventh round of the 2024 NHL entry draft and will be representing Switzerland at the World Juniors tournament for the second time of his young hockey career.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really excited to play this tournament [and I] already played last year [and it] was really fun,\u201d Sansonnens said. \u201cI think we have a great team, so we\u2019re looking forward to play[ing] in the tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n
With this being Sansonnens second appearance at this tournament, he believes that the prior experience has helped to elevate his confidence this year, and will allow him to feel more comfortable each game<\/p>\n
\u201cLast year, I didn\u2019t know what to expect, and now I\u2019m going to know the level that it\u2019s going to be. I\u2019m pretty confident going into the tournament, so I think it\u2019s going to be good for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sansonnens is currently playing professional hockey for the Lausanne Hockey Club in the Swiss League and shared his experience adapting to playing against opponents that are, on average, much stronger and larger than at the youth level.<\/p>\n
\u201cMen are bigger and stronger, so you need [a] couple of games to adapt and see what you\u2019re going to face through the year, but I think now I can play with those guys so that’s really nice,\u201d Sansonnens said. \u201cI mean, they\u2019re strong, but I\u2019m also strong, so that\u2019s good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sansonnens also shared his thoughts on Team Switzerland this year and believes that they have a high level of compete and desire to medal in the tournament this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur defence is pretty strong. We have a couple experienced guys playing pro hockey already, and then we have really fast forwards, so we had a lot of speed,\u201d Sansonnens said. \u201cI think we compete a lot, so it\u2019s not going to be fun for the other team to play against us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Switzerland will play their first game of the tournament against the United States on December 27, at 3:00 p.m P.T.<\/p>\n
Watch the latest episode here:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Canucks prospects Braeden Cootes, Wilson Bj\u00f6rck, and Basile Sansonnens join Canucks Insider Podcast host Chris Faber to discuss…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":373771,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-373770","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=373770"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373770\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/373771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=373770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=373770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=373770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}