The 2026 IIHF World Junior Championship marks the 50th anniversary of the annual 10-nation tournament featuring many of the best under-20 aged players in the world. It will be held at Grand Casino Arena, home to the NHL's Minnesota Wild, in Saint Paul, and 3M Arena at Mariucci on the University of Minnesota campus in Minneapolis, from Dec. 26-Jan. 5. Follow NHL.com for all the sights and stories.
Zach Parise can recall United States National Junior Team coach Mike Eaves pleading with his group to turn it up a notch during the second intermission of the gold-medal game against Canada at the 2004 IIHF World Junior Championship in Finland.
The unbeaten U.S., who at the time had advanced to the championship game for only the second time in the 28-year history of the tournament, were trailing 3-1.
"I do remember Coach calling me out in-between periods," Parise said with a grin. "It may have been a motivational thing. Something along the lines of, 'You better start playing.' It was a lot of that, and he was able to pull it out of us."
The U.S. scored twice in the opening 6:58 of the third period on goals by Patrick O'Sullivan and Ryan Kesler for a 3-3 tie before O'Sullivan scored his second of the game in the most unusual way to secure the first World Juniors gold medal for the United States.
O'Sullivan dumped a puck into Canada's end that goalie Marc-Andre Fleury looked to play, but his pass attempt instead deflected off Canada defenseman Braydon Coburn and into an empty net at 14:48 of the third.
"I mean, the flukiest goal you're ever going to see, but it got us the gold medal," Parise said.
Parise was voted most valuable player of the tournament after he had 11 points (five goals, six assists) in six games. He and U.S. goalie Al Montoya, who made 27 saves in the gold medal game, each were named to the WJC All-Star Team.
"It was an unbelievable group," U.S. assistant coach John Hynes said. "It was the same group we had that won the IIHF Under-18 World Championship (in 2001). You look at all the players off that team that have gone on to have great careers, but at that stage of their life, at 19 years old, to see them come together as a team and win the first one ever, was special."
To celebrate the tournament's 50th year, here 13 more of the most memorable World Junior Championship games (listed chronologically):
Dec. 29, 1988: Soviet Union 3, Sweden 2 (round-robin game)
We dove deep into the vault for this one, simply because of the star power witnessed at this event and the bizarre scenario that occurred in this game at Sullivan Arena in Anchorage, Alaska. With the Soviet Union ahead 3-2 and Sweden pressing for the equalizer with less than two minutes left in the third period, Soviet goalie Aleksei Ivashkin made a save and began tracking the puck into the corner. A second puck then appeared in the slot and a Sweden player knocked it into the net. American referee Steve Piotrowski waved off the goal and the Soviets held on for the one-goal victory that ended up being the difference between the gold for the Soviets and silver for Sweden as the head-to-head result decided the winner as each team went 6-1. The IIHF did an investigation that offered no concrete results, but one rumor was that a Soviet player took one of the commemorative pucks stored in a bucket of ice in the penalty box and tucked it into his pants, only to have it fall out during his shift. The Soviet Union possessed one of the most talented offensive lines to ever unite in the tournament, with Alexander Mogilny, Pavel Bure and Sergei Fedorov.
Jan. 4, 1991: Canada 3, Soviet Union 2 (round-robin game)
On the final day of the tournament, the two top teams faced off. The Soviet Union outshot Canada 17-3 in the third period but an unlikely hero, Canada defenseman John Slaney, scored his only goal of the tournament with 5:13 left in the third period to give the host country the win in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Slaney was so excited after scoring the goal that he sprained his ankle in the celebration and was forced to watch the final five minutes from the bench. Canada center Eric Lindros, at age 17, was voted the tournament's best forward.
Jan. 3, 2007: Canada 2, United States 1, SO (semifinals)
The game at Ejendals Arena in Leksand, Sweden, was a memorable one for Canada forward Jonathan Toews. In the third round of the three-round shootout, Toews beat U.S. goalie Jeff Frazee, but U.S. defenseman Jack Johnson scored against Carey Price to send the game to a sudden-death tiebreaker. Canada coach Craig Hartsburg went back to Toews in the fifth round and the 18-year-old scored, but Peter Mueller matched it for the U.S. After Andrew Cogliano scored for Canada and Johnson for the U.S. in the sixth round, Toews came out again in the seventh round and capped his shootout hat trick, beating Frazee for a third time. Price stopped Mueller to clinch the win, and Canada went on to defeat Russia 4-2 in the gold-medal game.
Jan. 3, 2009: Canada 6, Russia 5, SO (semifinals)
In one of the more dramatic finishes in tournament history, Jordan Eberle scored on a backhand off an assist from John Tavares with 5.4 seconds remaining in the third period to pull Canada into a 5-5 tie at Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa. "The biggest thing that goes under the radar is Ryan Ellis keeping the puck in along the wall," Eberle said. "He made a really good play. [Tavares] just threw it at the net and I was lucky enough to be there." After a 10-minute overtime, Eberle and Tavares scored back-to-back goals in the tiebreaker and Dustin Tokarski stopped both Russian shooters to send the host country to the gold-medal game, where it won 5-1 against Sweden for a fifth straight WJC title.
Jan. 5, 2010: United States 6, Canada 5, OT (gold-medal game)
Defenseman John Carlson dashed Canada's hopes of winning a sixth straight gold medal when he sent a wrist shot home at 4:21 of OT before 15,171 at Credit Union Centre in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Carlson, who was playing for Hershey, the Washington Capitals' American Hockey League, scored twice in the game. An interesting note is the United States held a selection camp prior to this tournament for the first time instead of just naming its 22-player roster. Eberle scored two goals in 1:14 late in the third period to force overtime, and all four goalies played in the game. Canada's Martin Jones (eight saves) replaced Jake Allen, who had allowed five goals on 28 shots. For the U.S., Mike Lee allowed three goals on seven shots before being replaced in the second period by Jack Campbell, who made 32 saves, including 17 in the third.
"I think for a goalie, you probably could have a common theme in that if you ask a lot of different goalies at different levels, generally the harder you try, the worse the outcome is," Allen said. "Generally when you want something too much, you get out of character yourself and that's usually what happens. I think that was a huge thing for me, looking back on it almost 16 years ago now. Obviously it was a tough moment for me, but I think it was a good lesson in the end too."
Jan. 5, 2011: Russia 5, Canada 3 (gold medal game)
In the most unexpected outcome in tournament history, Russia rallied from a three-goal deficit by scoring five times in the third period at KeyBank Center in Buffalo. Trailing 3-0 after two periods, Russia received goals by Artemi Panarin, Maxim Kitsyn and Vladimir Tarasenko in the opening 7:29 of the third. Panarin scored his second of the game to make it 4-3 at 15:22 before Nikita Dvurechenski sealed it with 1:16 remaining.
