Canada wants Tocchet at World Championships and two other Canucks are on the radar
The Vancouver Canucks will miss the playoffs, and that means some of their players could be heading to the IIHF World Championships.
The annual tournament begins on May 9 and will be hosted in Sweden and Denmark, with Stockholm serving as the primary host city.
Pittsburgh Penguins GM Kyle Dubas has been tasked with building Team Canada, and he’s got some Canucks in his sights. To start, Rick Tocchet is a prime candidate to lead Canada behind the bench and will be offered a spot on the coaching staff.
Tocchet was an assistant for Canada at this spring’s 4 Nations Face-Off and helped lead them to the championship. He’s a top candidate to be part of the coaching staff at next year’s Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics, and the World Championships could be a good way to keep up the relationship. The only potential stumbling block will be if Tocchet wants some rest after what’s been a wild season.
“Once it wraps with the Canucks in the next couple days, we’ll have a deeper discussion with Rick,” explained Dubas on Donnie & Dhali today. “We obviously want to have continuity between the staffs, but you also never know what exactly coaches or management or players have on the go outside of hockey with their day-to-day lives.
“We’ll see where Rick is at. Obviously, he’s one of the top coaches in the league and did a great job for us at the 4 Nations Face-Off, and we regard him very highly. We’ll see where he’s at once the year ends and what he has on the go and if he can fully jump into it. If so, that’s great and if not there’s a really strong group of Canadian coaches that would be excited to carry the ball in that role.”
Beyond Tocchet, there are also two Canucks players who could make the trip. Both Jake DeBrusk and Tyler Myers have caught Dubas’ attention with their strong play this season.
DeBrusk has set a new career high with 28 goals, and Myers is a solid veteran option, although he hasn’t played since April 2 as he works his way back from injury.
“Both players are firmly on the radar,” added Dubas. “We’ll continue to evaluate them here in the last couple of days before we have to start putting out invites and getting guys locked into the team and getting ready to travel to the pre-tournament on May 1.”
Canada came fourth place in last year’s tournament and will be hoping to do a lot better this year. With a few Canucks potentially on the roster, they’ll be hoping to win gold for the first time since 2023.