World Junior Championship: Top Five Tournament Hosts

Getting the chance to cover the world juniors is always an honor, but in most cases, it's also a fun travel experience. 

I've covered the tournament in person every year, starting with Saskatoon in 2010, with the exception of the pandemic bubble/Red Deer wedding debacles in Edmonton (but I did go to Edmonton for the summer version). 

Here are my top five World Junior Championship destinations from that period, excluding Toronto since I live there - but I will say that when Canada won gold at the Air Canada Centre that year, it was the loudest I've ever heard that building. On with the list!

OK, sure - the attendance was a noticeable drag on this tournament and exposed a major fault in Hockey Canada's old regime - but this edition featured the greatest game I've ever seen in person: the gold-medal tilt between Canada and Team USA. 

You're not allowed to cheer in the press box, but you can certainly gawk at a series of incredible plays by both teams, which is what we all did. Troy Terry, Charlie McAvoy and Thomas Chabot were all legendary that day. Plus, it's Montreal - so I went to Schwartz's, St-Hubert's and a vintage pinball bar. Win-win.

My first time in Sweden. Malmo was a cool trip, thanks to the city's downtown squares, and the weather was pretty decent the whole time. I learned that locals indiscriminately shoot off fireworks in said town squares to celebrate New Year's, plus the hockey was solid: Finland upset the host Swedes in the gold-medal game. 

This trip also featured an incredibly funny exchange with our waiter at an understaffed sports bar on Jan. 1, where a bunch of reporters had gathered to watch the Winter Classic:

Us: "Can we order food now?"

Waiter: "No."

Taking the train from Prague to Ostrava felt like a quintessential European experience. The hockey itself was good, and in the meantime, I learned that I love Czech dumplings and the food in general: basically every media meal was 'meat in sauce with potatoes' a.k.a. the Ryan Kennedy Special. 

I also did a day in Prague on the way back, where I walked around the magical city and ate a whole goose leg for dinner (with dumplings). If they held a future tournament in Prague, I would not be mad.

Believe it or not, this was my first time in Vancouver - and the second time came months later for the NHL draft. 

The city certainly lived up to the hype; it's gorgeous, with the mountains in the background and Stanley Park right there to explore. Awesome food city as well, and shout-out to THN's Jason Chen for taking me to a top-notch Dim Sum spot. Vancouver's mild climate also makes it very walkable, even at that time of year. Canucks press box popcorn is highly addictive.

My first, and possibly last time in Russia, but an incredible experience because it was so different. Having then-video producer Ted Cooper with me was massive, giving me someone to share it all with. 

All of our cab drivers were clearly just neighbors of whoever was working the front desk of our hotel at the time and not real cab drivers. One of the official IIHF shuttles almost got shaken down for a bribe by the cops. I discovered Vak Balish (basically the local version of a Samosa) and bought an ever-increasing amount for dinner at the rink from Day 2 until the gold medal game. The media interview room featured a second superfluous step in the doorway that every single one of us tripped over at least once. 

The crowds in Ufa were incredible and definitely not fire-marshal approved. We found a nightclub across the street from our hotel, and we weren't alone, as we saw one of the players there. Also fun because I ran into Nail Yakupov in the stairwell of the rink and had a nice chat with him (he was infamously kept away from the press for most of the tourney). I know a lot of folks dump on Yakupov, but I always found him fun to talk to. I think about the Ufa tournament a lot, to be honest.