Watch Canada take on Sweden in pre-competition action LIVE at 7 p.m. ET\/4 p.m. PT on TSN 1\/4, TSN.ca, and the TSN App<\/a><\/p>\nCanada invited 27 players to their pre-tournament camp, which will closely resemble the team that will take to the ice on Boxing Day against Czechia to open the World Juniors.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve changed the style of camp because we moved more towards preparation than evaluation,\u201d Hunter told TSN1050\u2019s First Up on Wednesday. \u201cThis is close to what we\u2019ve seen the Olympic teams do where they bring close to the team that will be participating.\u201d<\/p>\n
The change allows Hunter and head coach Dale Hunter the opportunity to get a better sense of where players fit in the lineup rather than focusing on evaluating who should be on their roster.<\/p>\n
Canada\u2019s coaching staff has been focusing on teaching, and adding structure to their game as they prepare to take on Sweden Wednesday night in their first test prior to the start of the tournament.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve had good practices, a lot of good teaching, and not just living off of our skill of our Canadian boys,\u201d said Hunter. \u201cOur goal right from the get-go is to get into the gold-medal game and win it. There\u2019s a process to that and preparation.\u201d<\/p>\n
While group participating in Canada\u2019s camp is close to what the team will look like, there will still be some hard decisions before the team heads to Minnesota. Hunter and his staff will have to make at least two cuts in order to be roster compliant.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not an all-star team; it\u2019s a team that has to have different intangibles,\u201d said Hunter. \u201cThese are tough decisions. We have the best players in Canada here and somebody\u2019s feelings are going to get hurt. We\u2019ll put a lot of time [into deciding].\u201d<\/p>\n
One of the biggest things the team is looking for is the best fit for each line. In particular, the Hunter wants to make sure phenom Gavin McKenna has the right players around him to fully compliment his playing style.<\/p>\n
McKenna, who turns 18 on Saturday, has been the runaway projected No. 1 pick in the 2026 NHL Draft and has sat at the top of TSN Director of Scouting Craig Button\u2019s list all season.<\/p>\n
The 6-foot winger dominated the Western Hockey League last season, recording 41 goals and 129 points in 56 games for the Medicine Hat Tigers as he led his team to a championship.<\/p>\n
He transferred to the NCAA this season to play with Penn State where he has four goals and 18 points in 16 games.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a player who\u2019s quick and fast, so I think it\u2019s important to get teammates who are the right fit on that line,\u201d said Hunter. \u201cHe has such a quick brain in moving puck that you have to have players who are ready because anything can happen on the ice.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what our coaches are working on right now so he can be successful. If he\u2019s successful, then our team will push along a lot better.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the camp features some household names like McKenna, San Jose Sharks forward Michael Misa, and a plethora of talent that has already been drafted in the NHL, Hunter believes some of the younger members of the roster can make a name for themselves at the tournament.<\/p>\n
Defenceman Keaton Verhoeff captained Canada at the Hlinka Gretzky Cup in August while Carson Carels and Chase Reid have starred in the CHL with the Prince George Raiders and Soo Greyhounds, respectively.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis isn\u2019t really a 17-year-old tournament, but we have some here,\u201d said Hunter. Guys like Carels and Verhoeff are exciting players and I\u2019m sure there will be lots of scouts to see how they look and how they adjust to the pace of play.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re intrigued too so we can see how they look in the pre-tournament games coming up.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Canada focuses on teaching, structure ahead of World Juniors After back-to-back fifth-place finishes at the World Juniors, Team…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":351625,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[712,49,48,132644,448,82,146516],"class_list":{"0":"post-351624","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-apple-news","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-hockey-canada-sports-hockey-hockey-canada","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-world-juniors-sports-hockey-world-juniors"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=351624"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/351624\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/351625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=351624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=351624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=351624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}