Preliminary Rosters Named for the 2016 World Cup of Hockey

The eight teams taking part in the 2016 World Cup of Hockey revealed their 16 player preliminary rosters on Wednesday. 

The tournament is slated to commence on September 17, 2016 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at the Air Canada Centre.  

Team USA will be represented between the pipes by Cory Schneider, of the New Jersey Devils, Ben Bishop, from the Tampa Bay Lightning and Jonathan Quick, from the Los Angeles Kings. On defense; Dustin Byfuglien, Winnipeg Jets, John Carlson, Washington Capitals, New York Rangers blueliner Ryan McDonagh, the Minnesota Wild’s Ryan Suter and from the Detroit Red Wings Justin Abdelkader. 

Chicago Blackhawks forward Patrick Kane will lead the core of forwards with Ryan Kesler from the Anaheim Ducks, T.J. Oshie of the Capitals, Max Pacioretty from the Montreal Canadiens, the Wild’s Zach Parise, Joe Pavelski from the San Jose Sharks, Derek Stepan from the Rangers and Blake Wheeler of the Jets.  

Team Canada will be backstopped by Corey Crawford, of the Blackhawks, Braden Holtby of the Capitals and Carey Price from the Canadiens. The blueliners will consist of Drew Doughty from the Kings, Duncan Keith from the Blackhawks, the Sharks, Marc-Edouard Vlasic and the Nashville Predators Shea Weber. 

Jamie Benn from the Dallas Stars, Patrice Bergeron of the Boston Bruins, Jeff Carter of the Kings, Sidney Crosby of the Pittsburgh Penguins, Ryan Getzlaf of the Ducks, Tyler Seguin of the Stars, Steven Stamkos of the Lightning, John Tavares from the New York Islanders and Jonathan Toews from the Blackhawks will be up front for Canada. 

The Russians will be represented by goaltenders from the Columbus Blue Jackets, Sergei Bobrovsky, Semyon Varlamov of the Colorado Avalanche and the Lightning’s Andrei Vasilevskiy.

Patrolling the blueline Dmitry Kulikov of the Florida Panthers, Candiens’ Andrei Markov and the Capitals Dmitry Orlov. 

The forwards will be Artem Anisimov of the Blackhawks, Pavel Datsyuk of the Red Wings, Nikita Kucherov of the Lightning, Nikolay Kulemin of the Islanders, Evgeny Kuznetsov of the Capitals, Evgeni Malkin of the Penguins, Vladisov Namestinov, of the Lightning, Alexander Ovechkin from the Capitals, Artemi Panarin from the Blackhawks and rounding out the forwards Vladimir Tarasenko from the St. Louis Blues.

Team Finland will be represented by Tuukka Rask from the Bruins, Pekka Rinne of the Predators and Olli Maatta from the Penguins between the pipes. 

On defense; will be the Buffalo Sabres Rasmus Ristolainen, Sami Vatanen of the Ducks and Esa Lindell from the Stars. 

The forwards will comprise of Mikka Koivu from the Wild, Jori Lehtera from the Blues, Aleksander Barkov and Jussi Jokinen of the Panthers, the Wild’s Mikael Granlund, Lightning’s Valtteri Filppula, Leo Kamarov from the Toronto Maple Leafs, Joonas Donskoi of the Sharks, Lauri Korpikoski of the Edmonton Oilers and Teuvo Teravainen from the Blackhawks.

The Czech Republic will be represented by forwards, Michael Frolik of the Calgary Flames, Martin Hanzel from the Arizona Coyotes, Tomas Hertl of the Sharks, David Krejci and David Pastrnak of the Bruins, Ondrei Palat of the Lightning, Tomas Plekanec of the Canadiens, Jakub Voracek of the Philadelphia Flyers and Vladimir Sobotka of the Kontinental Hockey League’s Avangard Omsk. 

Michal Kempny of Avangard Omsk will join Radko Gudas of the Flyers, Roman Polak of the Sharks and Andrej Sustr of the Lightning. Between the pipes will be Ondrej Pavelec of the Jets, Michael Neuvirth of the Flyers and Petr Mrazek of the Red Wings.

Rangers goaltender, Henrik Lundqvist and Canuks netminder, Jacob Markstrom will be between the pipes for the Swedish Team. They will be getting assistance on the blueline from Oliver Ekman-Larsson of the Coyotes, Victor Hedman and Anton Stralman from the Lightning, Niklas Hjalmarsson from the Blackhawks, Erik Karlsson of the Ottawa Senators and Niklas Kronwall of the Red Wings.

Up front for Sweden will be; Nicklas Backstrom of the Capitals, Loui Eriksson from the Bruins, Filip Forsberg from the Predators, Gabriel Landeskog of the Avalanche, Daniel and Henrik Sedin from the Canuks, Alexander Steen from the Blues and Henrik Zetterberg from the Red Wings. 

Team Europe will be represented some of the European nations that do not have many players in the National Hockey League. Jaroslav Halak (Slovakia) of the Islanders and Frederik Anderson (Denmark) will be between the pipes. 

Patrolling the blueline, Zdeno Chara (Slovakia) and Dennis Seidenberg (Germany) of the Bruins, Roman Josi (Switzerland) of the Predators, Andrej Sakera (Slovakia) of the Oilers and Mark Streit (Switzerland) of the Flyers. 

 

The forwards will be represented by from the Avalanche, Mikkel Boedker (Denmark), Oilers’ Leon Draisaitl (Germany), Jannik Hansen (Denmark) of the Canuks, Marian Hossa (Slovakia) of the Blackhawks, from the Kings Anze Kopitar (Slovenia), Frans Nielson (Denmark) of the Islanders, Tomas Tatar (Slovakia) of the Red Wings, Thomas Vanek (Austria) of the Wild and from the Rangers Mats Zuccarello (Norway). 

Team North America will be represented by players from the USA and Canada that are 23 years of age or younger as of October 1. Connor Hellebuyck of the American Hockey League’s Manitoba Moose will join the Ducks netminder, John Gibson and Penguins goaltender Matthew Murray between the pipes for the young stars. 

 Aaron Ekblad of the Panthers, Seth Jones and Ryan Murray of the Blue Jackets and Morgan Rielly of the Maple Leafs will be patrolling the blueline for the North American team. 

Up will be front Sean Couturier of the Flyers, Jack Eichel from the Sabres, Johnny Gaudreau and Sean Monahan of the Flames, Dylan Larkin of the Red Wings, Nathan McKinon of the Avalanche, Connor McDavid of the Oilers, J.T. Miller of the Rangers and Brandon Saad of the Blue Jackets. 

The World Cup tournament will run from September 17 through October 1 in Toronto. Final rosters for each of the eight teams should be announced June 1.