Over the last four periods of the group stage at the 2025 Hlinka Gretzky Cup, Canada produced a lot of offense, but none more than the trio consisting of the Ruck twins, Liam and Markus, with Mathis Preston. The Rucks come from Osoyoos, B.C., Preston is from Penticton, 60 km to the north, and they all go way back.

“Us two and Mathis played spring hockey pretty much our whole lives together,” said Liam. “A couple of years at Okanagan Academy and we’ve just always been friends. Just being out there with them is unreal.”

“It’s amazing,” said Markus. “Obviously my brother, I’ve played with him my whole life and then Mathis too, we’ve been with him for 10 years or so, it’s amazing having them by me every step of the way.”

All three currently play in the WHL – the Rucks for the Medicine Hat Tigers and Preston for the Spokane Chiefs.

For the first game against Finland and the first two periods of the second game against Switzerland, they played on three separate lines. At that point, the Canadians held a slim 1-0 lead on the Swiss but broke it open in the third period to win 9-1. Preston recorded a hat trick that game, with the twins assisting on two of the goals.

“It’s something we put together at the U-17s,” said Canadian coach Mathieu Turcotte, who coached the trio for the Canada White team at last year’s U-17 World Challenge in Sarnia, Ont. “Preston was one of the top scorers in that tournament with Markus and Liam, so we figured we’d give it a shot after two periods today. Maybe we shouldn’t have waited that long.”

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“I think it was kind of a matter of time before we started playing together,” said Preston. “We played together at the U-17s, did pretty well there, and obviously, our whole lives we’ve been playing together growing up. They’re unreal players and I couldn’t have done it out there without them.”

Then in the last group stage game against Czechia, the trio combined for a first-period goal to give Canada a 1-0 lead through two periods.

“That was awesome,” Liam said of the 1-0 goal. “Good speed by Preston to get it started and then my brother followed it up and made a nice play to me. All I had to do was put it in.”

In the third period, Canada once again broke the game open with four goals to win 5-0.

Landon DuPont: 'Playing With The Older Guys Is Awesome' Through two periods of their game against Switzerland at the 2025 Hlinka Gretzky Cup, Canada had outshot Switzerland 32-8 but led only 1-0. Defenseman Landon DuPont, the youngest player on the team, led the team with over 18 minutes of ice time and six shots on goal. He had also assisted on Dimian Zhilkin’s lone goal.

“It was tight after two,” said Markus. “You go into the room and you try to stay positive. It was a stressful game but I think everyone was calm in there, everyone was positive, came out in the third ready to play and it paid off.”

“That was not a 5-0 game at all,” said Liam. “They’re a really good team, credit to them and their coaching staff. They played hard all night and we got some bounces late and made it a 5-0 game but that was tight all the way through.”

Looking ahead to the semifinal against the USA, Liam said, “They’re always a great team. They play fast and we’ve just got to be ready to match that. We’ve got a good, deep team and we’re ready for them.”

“Whatever our coach thinks is going to give us the best chance to win,” said Liam. “If that’s what it is, then that’d be great, but whatever he needs, we’ll provide.”

Hlinka Gretzky Cup Group Stage Finished, Friday's Matchups Set After the results of the four games on Wednesday, Friday's schedule will feature four border wars. The semifinals are Canada vs USA and Sweden vs Finland, while Czechia and Slovakia will meet for fifth place and Switzerland and Germany for seventh.