Colorado Avalanche players heading to IIHF World Championships

Following the final day of the 2018-19 season for the Colorado Avalanche, several players from the team have now decided to fly to Slovakia and play for their home countries in the IIHF Men’s World Hockey Championships. The tournament started today (Friday), but countries always leave roster spots open for late arrivals from the NHL and AHL playoffs.

Tyson Jost

TyJo was the first of the Avalanche to sign up for the tournament. He’s joined a short-handed Canada squad containing a lot of young and inexperienced players. They were dealt a massive blow on the final day of their training camp when Toronto Maple Leafs center John Tavares suffered an oblique injury and was called straight home by Kyle Dubas and the team. Without him, there should be a lot of opportunity for Jost to strut his stuff.

Tom and Lauren put together a quick breakdown of the team and where he will fit, along with who Jost knows from his past with Team Canada.

Philipp Grubauer

Gru will be joining fellow NHLers Leon Draisaitl from the Edmonton Oilers and Korbinian Holzer from the Anaheim Ducks on Team Germany for the tournament. Germany should be able to get out of the group stage; they just need to be top four among the United States, Canada, Finland, Slovakia, Denmark, France, and Great Britain.

Germany currently has two goalies on the roster, but both are local DEL (Deutsche Eishockey Liga) players so Grubauer will almost certainly step in as the starting goalie and play every game.

Nikita Zadorov

The Russians are a stacked team in Group B. A lot of their best players fell out of the NHL playoffs in the first round and are fully ready to get some revenge on the world stage. Alex Ovechkin, Evgeni Malkin, and Nikita Kucherov are there just to name a few. Their defense has looked a little thin (what’s new) with only Nikita Zaitsev, Mikhail Sergachev, and Dmitry Orlov the only players on the back end from the NHL. Zadorov will likely step right into the top six behind those three and Nikita Nesterov from the KHL (formerly the Tampa Bay Lightning and Montreal Canadiens).

Here are their lines:

Sven Andrighetto

Andrighetto is not currently on Switzerland’s World Championship team, but he is expected to join on Sunday according to their official Twitter account. Shout out to Shana on Twitter for the scoop. The Swiss have forwards Nico Hischier, and Kevin Fiala from the NHL already on the team, along with defensemen Roman Josi, and Yannick Weber.

The Maybes

Canada has one spot on defense left to fill, so there’s a strong chance they take one of Tyson Barrie, Cale Makar, or Samuel Girard with them. Likely, the Avalanche are already in contact with Hockey Canada to hash out who goes and who stays at home.

Pavel Francouz is available for the Czech Republic after the Colorado Eagles were bounced from the Calder Cup playoffs in the first round by the Bakersfield Condors. After Czeching with their roster on the official IIHF website, the Czech Republic has an open spot on goal. According to Elite Prospects, Francouz is already with them. Whether it becomes official or another player takes the third spot ahead of Francouz remains to be seen.