Anticipation and expectations on the rise for Team Canada in pre-Olympic hockey season

There will be plenty of opportunities to watch Canada’s top hockey players in action this season, as well as get a feel for potential rosters for the upcoming Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games.

Milano Cortina will mark the return of NHL players to the Olympic Winter Games for the first time since Sochi 2014, which will have a huge impact on the expected results from Team Canada’s men’s team. The Canadian women have never missed the podium since women’s ice hockey made its Olympic debut at Nagano 1998 and they enter the season as the reigning world champions.

Major Competitions in Canada

  • Women: 2024-2025 Rivalry Series – November/February – Multiple locations 
  • Men: 4 Nations Face-Off – February 12-20, 2025 – Montreal and Boston 

World Championships 

  • 2025 IIHF Women’s World Championship – April-9-20, 2025 – České Budějovice, Czechia
  • 2025 IIHF Men’s World Championship – May 9-25, 2025 – Stockholm, Sweden and Herning, Denmark

What to Watch 

Canada’s National Women’s Team will take to the ice starting in November for another installment of their fierce Rivalry Series against Team USA. The first three games will take place south of the border, with game one (November 6) in San Jose, California, game two (November 8) in West Valley City, Utah, and game three (November 10) in Boise, Idaho. The series will then come home to Canada in February, with games in Halifax, Nova Scotia (February 6) and Summerside, PEI (February 8).

Among the 48 players invited to Team Canada’s camp in September, 21 were returnees from Team Canada’s gold medal-winning world championship team from 2024. Headliners included four-time Olympic medallist Marie-Philip Poulin, also known as “Captain Clutch,” and Beijing 2022’s leading scorer, Sarah Nurse. The group also included goaltender Ann-Renée Desbiens, who started the gold medal games at Beijing 2022 and the 2024 Worlds, and veteran assistant captains Jocelyne Larocque and Blayre Turnbull.

Those games will be played around the PWHL schedule, which kicks off its second season on November 30. Team Canada’s roster will be largely made up of players who compete for one of the six franchises.  

Next up on the calendar will be the 4 Nations Face-Off tournament for the men, featuring matchups between the powerhouse hockey nations of Canada, USA, Finland, and Sweden. Games will be split between Montreal and Boston. It will be the first best-on-best tournament with NHL players since the World Cup of Hockey 2016. 

Six players have already been confirmed for Team Canada’s 4 Nations roster: Sidney Crosby, Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, Cale Makar, Brayden Point and Brad Marchand. Of that all-star lineup, only Crosby is an Olympian, due to the NHL’s decision to skip the PyeongChang 2018 and Beijing 2022 Games. Crosby has two Olympic gold medals to his name, one from Vancouver 2010 where he scored the famous “golden goal,” and a second from Sochi 2014, where he served as Team Canada’s captain. Team Canada fans will eagerly anticipate the now-37-year-old Crosby teaming up with the NHL’s top Canadian talent for a preview of what the Olympic squad could look like for the 2026 Games.

Of the world championship tournaments in the spring, the women’s edition will go first, taking place in České Budějovice, Czechia in April. There is a break in the PWHL schedule to account for the world championship. Team Canada defeated the United States to take the title with a 6-5 overtime win in the gold medal match at the 2024 edition in Utica, New York. This achievement marked Team Canada’s 13th time bringing home the women’s world championship title.

The 2025 men’s world championship will take place in May, split between Stockholm, Sweden and Herning, Denmark. With the Stanley Cup Playoffs ongoing at the time, only players whose NHL teams have been eliminated by that point will be able to compete. Team Canada has won the title 28 times in the history of the tournament–more than any other country in the world. Canada finished fourth in the 2024 edition.