Nashville Predators prospect Vladislav Kamenev has been named the captain of Team Russia for the 2016 World Junior Championship in Helsinki, Finland, the Russian team announced on Friday.
Kamenev will be captaining a Russian squad for the second time in his young career. The 19-year-old also wore the “C” at the U-18 tournament in 2014.
It’s his second trip to the World Juniors for Russia. He wound up scoring a goal and three assists through seven games for Russia in last year’s tournament. With many returnees and some exciting new additions — like Kirill Kaprizov — the 2015 silver medalists are set to be competitive again this year.
It’s been a big year for the 2014 2nd round pick. He’s spent the last two seasons grabbing games in the KHL with Metallurg Magnitogorsk. It’s impressive for a 17-year-old to be seeing any games in that league no matter how they perform.
But this year he made the jump to North America, playing 24 games with the Milwaukee Admirals in the AHL so far. He’s scored six goals and 14 points.
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