Among the news announced during the NHL All-Star weekend, arguably the biggest was the confirmation that we will finally see the return of best-on-best international hockey tournaments in 2025 and 2026. The last such event was the World Cup of Hockey in fall 2016, and even that one had the gimmicks of Team North American and Team Europe. Prior to that, the last one with full participation of the NHL in an IIHF tournament was the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.
It’s extremely unfortunate that over the last decade we have been deprived of seeing players like Auston Matthews and the Brothers Tkachuk and Hughes represent Team USA, or to see Sidney Crosby pass the torch as teammates with Connor McDavid on Team Canada. The good news is, we’re confirmed to have an NHL-run event in 2025, followed by the Winter Olympics in 2026 (in Milan, Italy) and 2030 (most likely in France or Switzerland) thanks to an agreement among the NHL, NHLPA, IIHF, and IOC. Though not confirmed, it is presumed that Salt Lake City will host the 2034 games, and certainly the NHL would not skip that (especially if Utah gets the Coyotes or an expansion team by then).
Since we’re just a year away from the 4 Nations Face-Off, let’s take a look at which members of the Columbus Blue Jackets could get the call.
United States
In 2016, the Blue Jackets felt like they were led by Americans. John Tortorella was coach of Team USA in that World Cup and was joined on the team by CBJ alternate captains Jack Johnson and Brandon Dubinsky. Nick Foligno was captain and remains the only US-born captain in franchise history (the others are all Canadians). The first pair from 2016-17 through 2020-21 were the All-American Zach Werenski and Seth Jones.
Most of those guys are gone, but the two highest-paid players on the roster are Werenski and Johnny Gaudreau. When The Athletic predicted the US roster in December, Werenski made each list. What wasn’t clear was whether he would be a spare, or if he could get playing time over Luke Hughes. Quinn Hughes and Jaccob Slavin should have the top two spots on the left locked down.
Gaudreau, on the other hand, did not make the cut in those projections. The American team is so much deeper with elite forwards than it has been, so a season like Gaudreau is having won’t make the cut. As Eric Duhatschek wrote, “It’s astonishing how far Gaudreau has fallen — from the No. 2 scorer in the NHL as recently as two seasons ago to now probably not even on the radar, given how at least two other small skilled forwards, Alex DeBrincat and Clayton Keller, have exceeded his contributions.”
I still believe Gaudreau will be on the short list for consideration, but will need to get off to a hot start next season (i.e. back to a point-per-game pace) in order to make the cut in a highly competitive race.
Canada
While Team USA has made great strides in the last decade and should ice their strongest roster ever, Canada remains the team to beat. They have won the last two World Cups (in 2004 and 2016) and 3 of the 5 Olympics to have featured NHL players (2002, 2010, 2014). Look at this projection from NHL.com, and realize how many good players are left off.
Maybe, given the rumored interests playoff teams have in Boone Jenner, he could sneak on as a spare fourth liner for grit purposes (not really going to be needed in what is effectively an expanded All-Star weekend). Youngsters Kent Johnson and Adam Fantilli have represented Canada well in both the junior and senior World Championships, but would need to have a great finish this season and/or a huge leap forward next fall to have any chance. Still, Connor Bedard is penciled in, and those guys aren’t that far behind his production so far. Yet.
Sweden
Neither Adam Boqvist nor Emil Bemstrom is cracking this roster, and I’m also not certain that either will be part of the organization past this season.
Finland
Despite a Finnish general manager (Jarmo Kekalainen) and a Finnish director of amateur scouting (Ville Siren), the Blue Jackets are pretty thin on Finnish players in the organization. Mikael Pyyhtia and Oiva Keskinen are not close to the NHL yet, so that leaves Patrik Laine. This NHL.com projection leaves Laine off, citing a lack of dependability and a preference for linemates with existing chemistry.
If Laine can overcome his injury history and current off-ice matters, I can’t imagine his star power being left off the roster. He had a big year for the national team in 2015-16, scoring 7/6/13 in 7 games in the World Juniors, as he led Finland to the gold medal, then followed that up in the spring with 7/5/12 in 10 games to earn tournament MVP honors as an 18 year old to go along with a silver medal for the team.
Other Countries for the 2026 Olympics
So much can change in two years so it’s difficult to project who will still be on the Blue Jackets’ roster, let alone which ones will be successful enough then to make their national team. That being said, here are some players on the radar for their countries:
France: Alexandre Texier. Texier has played for the French team on a near-annual basis. We know how fond he is of his homeland, and he’s one of just two Frenchmen currently in the NHL.
Latvia: Elvis Merzlikins. After posting a .914 SV% and 2.78 GAA in 5 games in 2019, Elvis has passed up playing for Latvia in the World Championships several times, whether for family reasons (2021) or to focus on NHL conditioning (2023). He did suit up in 2022 but put up just an .862 SV% and 4.26 GAA in 5 games.
Norway: Ole Julian Bjorgvik Holm. The Norwegian program is on the decline, and failed to qualify for the 2022 Olympics. They will play in a final qualification group in August and September but host country Denmark could be hard to beat. OJBH should be part of the squad that makes the attempt, however.
The Russia Thing
Why is the NHL holding an event with just 4 teams, rather than at least a 6 team World Cup? Because they don’t want to deal with the Russia question. Due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the IIHF currently bans the Russian and Belarussian teams from their events. The IIHF isn’t running this one, but I can see why the NHL doesn’t want that fight. As for 2026, there’s the weird situation where for years now Russia was already banned by the IOC for widespread doping, which has resulted in Russian athletes competing as “Olympic Athletes from Russia” under the Olympic flag rather than the Russian one. That wouldn’t get around the ban, since the IIHF determines who qualifies for the Olympics.
Who can know how the international political scene will change in two years (could be something like this as far as we know. AHHH MOTHERLAND), but if/when Russia can compete again, I hope we can see all of our beloved Troika play for them. Hell, that line could be a killer third line in a best-on-best tournament. With opponents focusing on forwards like Artemi Panarin, Nikita Kucherov, Kirill Kaprizov, Matvei Michkov, etc., the line of Yegor Chinakhov/Dmitri Voronkov/Kirill Marchenko could feast on more favorable match-ups.