SAN JOSE – San Jose Sharks rookie centerman Macklin Celebrini knows what the players on this year’s Canadian World Juniors team are going through.
A year ago, at the IIHF World Junior Championships in Gothenburg, Sweden, Celebrini and his Canadian teammates, including Sharks prospect defenseman Jake Furlong, lost in the quarterfinals to Czechia, ending the hockey-mad country’s hopes of seeing its team medal for a fifth straight year.
The same scenario occurred Thursday night. But instead of it taking place overseas, like last year, the deciding game was held in front of over 18,000 people at the Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa and televised coast to coast north of the border in prime time.
Playing in a single-elimination quarterfinal game, again against Czechia, Canada rallied back from a two-goal deficit only to give up a power-play goal with less than a minute left in regulation time.
Czechia won 4-3, leaving Canada without a medal in back-to-back years in the under-20 event for the first time since 2013 and 2014. It’s also the first time Canada has lost in the quarterfinals in consecutive years.
Celebrini, from North Vancouver, had eight points in five games to lead Canada last year. Fellow Sharks rookie Will Smith had nine points in seven games, as he and Sharks prospect Eric Pohlkamp helped Team USA win the gold medal.
“It’s tough, especially in Canada,” Celebrini said. “I can only imagine the pressure and the media attention that they were getting. We lost the exact same way last year. So I know what they’re going through, and it sucks.”
The pressure on Canadians to win gold at the World Junior Championships can be immense.
Americans must deal with high expectations in international basketball, particularly at the Olympics, and Brazilian soccer players endure the same at the FIFA World Cup every four years.
The difference is that while the Americans and Brazilians are older and are usually professionals, the Canadians at the World Juniors are mainly between 17 and 19 years old.
“People don’t realize they did everything they could to win,” the now 18-year-old Celebrini said of the Canadian team. “Sometimes that’s just the way it goes.”
Since Canada’s loss Thursday, fans and pundits in that country have done plenty of second-guessing. This includes deciding who to invite to the team’s selection camp (multiple high-profile prospects were left out) and the coaching staff’s decision to have minimal on-ice practice time during the event to conserve the players’ energy.
Ultimately, the Canadians just didn’t score enough goals – 13 in five games, including a combined three in losses to Lativa and the United States – and were shorthanded far too often with a tournament-high 113 penalty minutes.
“Who do you blame? You can blame me,” said Scott Salmond, Hockey Canada’s senior vice president of hockey operations, on Friday. “In our country, you’ve got to win way more often than you lose, and that’s what we sign up for.”
Before the 2024 World Junior championships in Sweden, Canada had won gold in three of the past four years, a string of success only interrupted by Team USA’s win in 2021 in Edmonton. Still, given what’s happened the last two years, Celebrini was asked if Hockey Canada should do anything differently.
“I don’t know. That’s not kind of what I worry about,” Celebrini said. “There are people that get hired that have done that in the NHL and do that for various organizations that get hired for those jobs, to build those rosters, and in a short tournament, you’ve got to kind of pick the guys you think will help you get there.
“That’s just kind of way it’s always been. It’s the exact same way that every other country approaches it.”
Sharks forward Ty Dellandrea was on the victorious Canadian team that won gold during the 2020 tournament in the Czech Republic.
“We had a really good team, a close team, good coaches (with Mark and Dale) Hunter brothers,” said Dellandrea, who had five points in seven games in that tournament. “There’s a lot of pressure, especially in Canada. That’s a tough element, too. We were in the Czech Republic, which kind of feels a bit away from it, even though all the fans there are Canadians, even in the Czech Republic.
“A lot of pressure on those kids. You’re still at a young age where you’re learning and growing. So Hockey Canada does a good job of kind of dialing it in and making sure you’re away from all the distractions.”
The tournament continues with the two semifinals on Saturday, with Sweden playing Finland in one and Czechia taking on the United States in the other. The gold medal game is Sunday at 4:30 p.m. (PST). Kasper Halttunen is playing for Finland and fellow Sharks prospect Brandon Svoboda is competing for the American team. All games will be televised on the NHL Network.
