With the flurry of announcements for the reborn World Cup of Hockey on Wednesday, details about Team Europe have come into focus, including the announcement of the team’s management group and coach.
The team’s President/Team Leader will be German Ice Hockey Federation President Franz Reindl, with former NHLer and Slovakian National Team captain Miroslav Satan serving as Team Europe’s General Manager.
Team Europe also took the opportunity on Wednesday to announce that former Oilers head coach Ralph Krueger will be the squad’s bench boss.
Team Europe will be comprised of European players whose teams are not currently represented in the eight-team tournament. That means the team will have their pick of players from Germany, Slovakia, Austria, Denmark, France, Italy, Slovenia, Switzerland and Norway.
There’s a good group of NHLers to pick from there, but Sportsnet’s Chris Johnston notes that Reindl said on Wednesday that they haven’t closed the door on bringing in non-NHL players to fill out the roster.
This still leaves a lot of questions about Team Europe. Who is designing their jerseys and are there nods to the countries represented? Or as Steven Stamkos noted during the NHL and NHLPA’s announcement event, what national anthem do they play after they win a game. “The Final Countdown” should be in the mix.
Teams will announce their rosters in March 2016 and the tournament will begin on September 17.
