The Boston Bruins will be well represented at the 2016 World Cup of Hockey. The two-week tournament, put together by the NHL and the NHLPA will have some of the best hockey players on the planet compete against in each other to see which nation has the best hockey team. The tournament will be held in Toronto, and the games will be played at Air Canada Centre in Toronto (Hey, at least Toronto will get to see some outstanding hockey played in their stadium this season.).
At the moment, there are seven members of the Black and Gold representing various teams in the tournament, and it’s entirely probable one or two more Bruins will be added to the roster.
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“Every time you wear that jersey [for your country] it’s pretty special, so that’s exciting,” said B’s forward David Krejci. “I think it’s going to be good preparation for the season. I think it will be pretty much the same thing [as the Olympics]. There are so many good teams, and the NHL is doing it so we know they’ll be doing a good job. I think it’s going to be a great event.”
The Boston Bruins have been a truly international team these last few seasons. The current roster has players from seven different nations. Bruins forwards David Krejci and David Pastrnak both got the nod to be on the Czech Republic team. Tuukka Rask will be guarding the crease for his native Finland. Forward Loui Eriksson will play for Sweden. Once again, Canada has called upon Patrice Bergeron to go and win another international competition for their country.
The competition’s organizers even put together a ‘Team Europe’. To help fill out the roster for this squad, the organizers looked no further than the TD Garden. Bruins captain and Slovakian native Zdeno Chara and German defenseman Dennis Seidenberg were asked to join the squad, so they’ll be in the competition as well.
The tournament also chose to look at the Bruins coaching staff as well. Bruins bench boss Claude Julien will be part of Team Canada’s coaching staff. It will be a repeat of the magic Julien and Bergeron created when Team Canada won Gold in the 2014 Olympics in Sochi.
While the Bruins have seven members at the moment, the teams rosters are still in a state of transition. and more people could be called up. Brad Marchand, whose snub surprised a lot of people in the hockey community (and who is currently tied for third in goals this season with Tyler Seguin and Jaime Benn (who ARE on the team)) could easily get called up to represent Team Canada. The Bruins could also see Torey Krug get a call to play for Team USA (while it’s less likely than Marchand getting called up, it’s still possible.)