Experts project which prospects will make 2025 World Junior Championship rosters
Experts project which prospects will make 2025 World Junior Championship rosters
The annual World Junior Championship tournament will be held in Ottawa, ON, between Dec. 26 and Jan. 5.
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The tournament will be comprised of ten teams split up into two groups of five. They will all play four games in a round-robin, with the top teams advancing to single-game elimination quarter-final, semi-final, and championship games.
The WJC rosters comprise each nation's top U20 players, meaning players from the previous two NHL Entry Drafts and those who have yet to become draft eligible will make rosters.
The Anaheim Ducks have several prospects eligible and hope to make their nation's final cut for the tournament.
Many experts specializing in prospect evaluation from various outlets have already taken a run at projecting which players will make the final rosters for several countries participating.
Beckett Sennecke
Sennecke is the current top prospect in the Anaheim Ducks organization. He was a surprise third-overall selection in the 2024 NHL Entry Draft and currently has 15 goals and 29 points in 20 games for the Oshawa Generals of the OHL in 2024-25.
The Hockey News' Tony Ferrari, The Athletic's Scott Wheeler, and TSN's Craig Button have all taken a stab at predicting Team Canada's WJC roster. Ferrari was the only one to project Sennecke to make the final cut.
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"Adding (Calum Ritchie's) Oshawa teammate and 2024 third-overall pick, Beckett Sennecke, to their wing would bring some instant chemistry to the top of the lineup as well," Ferrari stated in his piece.
If Sennecke doesn't make Canada's roster, it will mark the first time since Jean-Pierre Dumont in 1997 that a third-overall draft pick (who wasn't playing in the NHL) didn't make a subsequent World Junior Championship roster.
Carey Terrance
Terrance made Team USA's 2024 World Junior Championship roster and won a gold medal but was a healthy scratch for all seven of the team's matchups. He was selected by Anaheim with the 59th overall pick in the 2023 NHL Entry Draft and currently has 22 points in 23 games as the captain of the Erie Otters of the OHL.
Those who have projected USA's final roster (Scott Wheeler, Tony Ferrari, and FloHockey's Chris Peters) all have Terrance making the squad in a fourth-line role.
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"It was awesome to come back home with a gold medal," Terrance said during Ducks' rookie camp of his time at the 2024 World Junior Championship. "I learned a lot from older players like Cutter (Gauthier) and Rutger (McGroarty). It was a really good time, and hopefully, we can do it again. I think come Christmas time, I'm going to have a big role on the team, and I'm excited for it."
Austin Burnevik
Burnevik has turned some heads early in the 2024-25 season. The St. Cloud State freshman is co-leading his 9-4-0 team in scoring with seven goals and 12 points in 13 games.
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Burnevik was selected in the sixth round (182nd overall) by the Ducks in 2024, with skating cited as his only significant drawback. It hasn't seemed to hinder him from producing at the NCAA level, and he is now in consideration for USA's World Junior roster.
Scott Wheeler and Tony Ferrari omitted him from their projections, but Chris Peters predicted the 6-foot-4, 200-pound winger would make the team in one of their final spots.
Lucas Pettersson
Pettersson has spent time at the J20 Nationell (Sweden's Junior League), HockeyAllsvenskan (Sweden's second-tier professional league), and the SHL (Sweden's top professional league) levels in 2024-25.
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He was reassigned to the J20 Nationell by MoDo Hockey, where he has six points in five games this season.
On Friday, Pettersson signed a two-year contract extension with MoDo, set to expire in 2027.
The 5-foot-11 center was selected with the 35th pick in the 2024 NHL Draft as a detail-oriented two-way center with above-average skating ability. He was the first Swedish player selected in his draft.
The only expert to have predicted Sweden's World Junior roster was Scott Wheeler, who listed him among the last cuts not to make his projected roster. It should be noted his projection only consisted of 12 forward spots.
Others in Consideration
Two Ducks prospects selected in the 2023 draft are already playing professional hockey in North America with the San Diego Gulls of the AHL: Nico Myatovic (33rd overall in 2023) and Coulson Pitre (65th in '23).
Two prospects are playing for Färjestad BK of the SHL: Damian Clara and Stian Solberg. Neither Clara's Italy nor Solberg's Norway will be present at the 2025 World Junior Championship.
Two prospects, Vojtech Port (Czechia) and Darels Uljanskis (Latvia), hail from lower-profile nations who will be present at the WJC.
Vojtech Port
Port was selected in the sixth round (161st overall) by the Ducks in the 2023 NHL Draft. He is one of 20 players from Czechia drafted in the past two drafts.
In 2024-25, he had three assists in 19 games playing for the Moose Jaw Warriors of the WHL before he was traded to the Lethbridge Hurricanes, where he has one assist in four games.
Port didn't make Wheeler's 20-man roster projection for Czechia.
Darels Uljanskis
Uljanskis was selected by the Ducks in the seventh round (214th overall) in the 2024 NHL Draft. He is one of three Latvian players drafted in the last two years.
He represented Latvia at the 2024 World Junior Championship, managing to tally an assist in five games, and at the 2024 U18 World Championship, where he wore an "A" and scored a goal and an assist in five games.
He's currently playing in the J20 Nationell league in Sweden, where he has five goals and 15 points in 22 games.