European nations have been leaving their veteran stars behind all season in favor of giving more players opportunities to fight for national team roster spots at the 2026 Olympics. Is it a path Canada should have followed at the Rivalry Series?
After Canada's disastrous opening games to the 2025 Rivalry Series, many questions were raised about Team Canada's current 30 player pool, and if the group is good enough to win gold moving forward.
Of course when it comes to Canada and USA, anything can happen in a one game final, but would Canada have benefitted from altering their player selection process, following the path of many European nations?
At recent Women's Euro Hockey Tour stops, a four nation tournament featuring Finland, Sweden, Czechia, and Switzerland, most nations have used at least one tournament to test their second wave of players, while leaving their top stars at home.
In the final Women's Euro Hockey Tour stop, Finland will compete without Ronja Savolainen, Sanni Ahola, Michelle Karvinen, Susanna Tapani, Viivi Vainikka, Elisa Holopainen, and Sanni Rantala, among others.
It serves two purposes First, Finland's top players get a week off to rest and recuperate in the middle of a busy season, avoiding further risk of injury. It also gives the national program an opportunity to evaluate players that might otherwise slip through the cracks. Picking stars is easy, but the real challenge is in selecting depth, a point that's compounded if you're only seeing them in limited moments.
For Canada, a team that is rapidly aging, and has seen several key players including Ann-Renee Desbiens, Sarah Nurse, Daryl Watts, Ella Shelton, and Emily Clark already miss time due to injury, does bringing every top player to each Rivalry Series event make sense? Or should Canada have used the opportunity to find hidden potential in other players to strengthen their lineup in other areas?
With the history of injuries stemming from Rivalry Series competition already well documented, Canada protecting players like Marie-Philip Poulin, Renata Fast, and Sarah Fillier could be far more beneficial than the limited repetitions they'll get with the national team program in game situations. Before the PWHL existed, the Rivalry Series was paramount to international preparation. It still could be, but not as it's being used by Canada at present.
Who Could Canada Look At?
When you flash back through Canada's Rivalry Series and national team camp rosters over the last several seasons, a number of names jump off the page as players the national team could have looked at to bolster their lineup. There are also others who have never received a look from Canada who could positively impact their roster at the Olympics.
In the PWHL, this list includes forwards like Anne Cherkowski (New York Sirens), Abby Hustler (Minnesota Frost), Michela Cava (Vancouver Goldeneyes), or a defender like Kendall Cooper (Minnesota Frost). Even the opportunity to re-integrate past national team players like Ashton Bell (Vancouver Goldeneyes) would be useful, or to give more time to up and comers like Kayle Osborne (New York Sirens) or Caitlin Kraemer (Minnesota-Duluth).
Canada is long overdue in trial running NCAA players at the Rivalry Series as well. When you look at Team USA, their ability to develop college players into full time national team members is powering their international success, now and into the future.
Right now, Caitlin Kraemer (Minnesota-Duluth) and Chloe Primerano (Minnesota) are the only NCAA skaters in the mix with Canada, with Eve Gascon (Minnesota-Duluth) playing her first game for Canada at the first Rivalry Series stop.
Looking at Canada's talent pool in the NCAA however, it's unlikely that should be the case. Among Canada's NCAA prospects are players like Emma Pais (Colgate), Jocelyn Amos (Ohio State), and Issy Wunder (Princeton) who are all overdue for looks, as well as players like Kahlen Lamarche (Quinnipiac), Emma Venusio (Wisconsin), and Mackenzie Alexander (Princeton) whose offensive numbers warrant consideration. If you were to look even younger, NCAA rookies including Stryker Zablocki (Northeastern) and Sara Manness (Clarkson) aren't far off. Penn State's Danica Maynard is off to an exceptional start to her NCAA career and seeing the success of USA's puck moving defenders like Haley Winn, Caroline Harvey, and Cayla Barnes, it makes sense to keep a close eye on Maynard as well.
Canada can continue to operate in the same way with an extremely narrow pipeline to the national team that overlooks players who haven't come through the U-18 team no matter how much future success they have, and one that doesn't look at professionals outside the current pool. They can also continue to lean on aging players while keeping young stars on the sidelines, but eventually, it will catch up with the nation if it hasn't already.
Following the path of European nations who know their top players, and are instead focusing on building out their depth by giving opportunities to others to win their spot, Canada could help course correct the path they are on and maintain their spot atop women's hockey's hierarchy.