While the Pittsburgh Penguins season is over, captain Sidney Crosby isn’t quite ready to hang up his skates for the summer. Crosby will be joining Team Canada for the 2015 IIHF World Championships, which begin May 1 in Prague and Ostrava, Czech Republic.
Because the World Championships coincide with the NHL playoffs, Crosby hasn’t represented his national team since 2006. He scored eight goals and added eight assists in Canada’s nine games in his only previous appearance at the World Championships.
Crosby will join a talented group of forwards for Canada, including Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins of the Edmonton Oilers, Claude Giroux of the Philadelphia Flyers, and Tyler Seguin and Jason Spezza of the Dallas Stars among others. The full roster is available on Hockey Canada’s website.
If Canada were to win the gold medal, Crosby would join elite company. There are only 25 members of the Triple Gold Club – players that have won the Stanley Cup, an Olympic gold medal and a World Championship.
Canada opens the World Championships against Latvia on May 1 at 10:15 A.M.
Penguins center Evgeni Malkin, meanwhile, still hasn’t decided whether he will play n the tournament for Team Russia. Malkin had been hampered down the stretch with some nagging injuries and will discuss the situation with Penguins management before making a decision.
Malkin has heard from Team Russia but hasn't decided on worlds. #Penguins
— Shelly Anderson (@_ShellyAnderson) April 26, 2015
Four more Penguins players – defensemen Brian Dumoulin, Taylor Chorney and Derrick Pouliot and forward Scott Wilson – will be continuing their seasons as well. All four players were reassigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the American Hockey League on Sunday.
Chorney and Dumoulin both played in all five of the Penguins postseason contests, while Scott Wilson played in the final three games after filling in for injured winger Beau Bennett.
They’ll be joined in Wilkes-Barre by the Penguins’ 2012 third-round draft pick, Oskar Sundqvist, whose Skelleftea squad lost four games to two in the Swedish Hockey League finals on Thursday. Sundqvist, a center, had nine goals and 10 assists in 41 SHL games this season.
The AHL Penguins have a 2-0 lead in their best-of-five Eastern Conference Quarterfinal series with the Syracuse Crunch. The Penguins can advance with a win in Game 3 in on Wednesday at Syracuse.
Photo credit: Reuters
