Team Canada reveals 2026 World Juniors goal song and it's a legendary choice
The 2026 World Juniors are set to start next week, and Team Canada is looking for some redemption.
Last year’s tournament was a colossal disappointment for the Canadians, as they were eliminated in the quarterfinals by Czechia. Meanwhile, their arch-rival, the United States, marched along to a gold medal finish in the Canadian capital.
To reclaim their spot on top of the hockey world, Canada will need to score goals, which means that fans will be wanting to hear the team’s goal song as much as possible. In recent years, the Canadian squad has opted for some interesting goal song choices.
At the 2023 tournament, the Canadian team made headlines in Halifax after choosing the sea shanty “Heave Away” from Newfoundland band The Fables as their song. They followed that up in 2024 with another Atlantic Canada tune, “Ordinary Day” by Great Big Sea.
Last year, the national squad decided to switch gears with “Live Is Life” by Austrian band Opus.
This year, the team is leaning on one of the most legendary bands in Canadian history, with the Tragically Hip’s “Courage” being selected. The choice was revealed during a pre-tournament game against Sweden on Wednesday night.
Brady Martin did the honours with a blistering slap shot that opened the scoring.
Canada's goal song at the #WorldJuniors will be… Courage by The Tragically Hip! pic.twitter.com/lXeTiizGGz
— TSN (@TSN_Sports) December 18, 2025
The selection is about as Canadian as you could get, which makes sense for a team that is trying to get back to its usual dominance on the world stage. With the tournament taking place in Minnesota this season, Canada will want every bit of Canadiana they can get to help propel them to victory on hostile ice.
It is, however, a bit of an interesting pick for the World Juniors squad. Though the Tragically Hip remain a very popular band in Canada, they haven’t held a live performance since 2016, and frontman Gord Downie died shortly after in 2017. The players on this Team Canada roster were all born between 2006 and 2007, meaning most were either nine or 10 when The Hip last took to the stage.
That doesn’t seem to bother top 2026 NHL draft prospect Gavin McKenna, who gave some insight on the song selection.
“I think we got a lot of courage in this group,” McKenna said postgame. “We lost last year, there’s a lot of eyes on us, and we wanna have courage. Obviously, a Canadian band, so hopefully the Canadian fans like it.”
Team Canada will open up the tournament on Boxing Day with a game against Czechia. The New Year’s Eve game will see the Canadians face Finland.