One of the most scouted events of the entire NHL Draft season is here and FloHockey will be on the ground bringing you coverage. The 2025 IIHF World Men’s Under-18 Championship descends on Frisco and Allen, Texas, with 10 national teams vying for the gold medal.
Many of the players in the event are first-year draft-eligibles in 2025, while the rest won’t be eligible until 2026 or in some cases 2027. NHL brass and scouting staffs from all 32 teams will be in attendance to catch the final on-ice glimpse of many top prospects they’ll be considering to select at the NHL Draft in Los Angeles on June 27 and 28.
Team Canada enters the event as the defending gold medalist after stunning USA last year in the final. Gavin McKenna, who led that team in scoring and set a Canadian single-tournament record, is still eligible to play in the U18 Worlds, but is busy in the WHL playoffs possibly breaking more records there. Still, Canada will have a formidable team with a number of players that were part of the Hlinka-Gretzky Cup roster last summer.
Team USA will look to defend home ice with a roster comprised primarily of players from USA Hockey’s National Team Development Program. However, this year’s team features far more players from outside of the NTDP than in years past which denotes the weaker year this has been for the American Under-18s. They’ve also contended with an inordinate amount of injuries throughout the year. Among the players added from the outside are NCAA players Cullen Potter and Will Horcoff, who both played at the NTDP previously. Additionally, Team USA has added Frisco’s own Blake Fiddler to bolster the blue line after his season with the Edmonton Oil Kings.
Sweden is another team to watch closely with a number of projected high picks for this year and one of the top prospects for 2026 in forward Ivar Stenberg. The Swedes last won the tournament four years ago in Germany and will be looking to find their way back to the top of the podium. They’ll also be awaiting the potential arrival of top NHL Draft prospect Anton Frondell, who is still playing in the Allsvenskan championship series in Sweden.
Czechia is another team that has realistic medal hopes and could turn some heads. Youngstown Phantoms forward Adam Benák has been one of the best performers internationally for the Czechs in the last three years and just became available after his USHL season ended. He could be just dangerous enough to lead his team to a big result. This will be his third and final U18 World Championship after his USHL season ended in the Clark Cup Playoffs Tuesday night. Projected first-round pick Radim Mrtka is also
Slovakia has been on the rise in recent years and will look to make some noise in Texas. They’ll lean on 6-foot-5 goalie Michael Pradel, who was named to the Slovak World Junior team but didn’t see action. He’s been with the Tri-City Storm most of the year. They’ve also got some intriguing forwards including Adam Nemec and Alex Misiak, both of whom had older brothers drafted into the NHL.
With the tournament set to drop the puck Wednesday, here’s what else you need to know about the tournament.
If you’re familiar with the World Junior Championship, the U18s follows the same exact format. Each team plays a four-game round robin in the preliminary round. The top four teams from each group advance to the quarterfinals, with the top team from Group A playing the fourth-place team in Group B, second place in Group A plays third place in Group B and then you have the same format for the top team and second-place team from Group B.
The tournament re-seeds after the quarterfinal, with the highest seed playing the lowest remaining seed, regardless of group, in the semifinals.
There is a gold-medal game played between the winners of the semifinal and the bronze-medal game played by the losing teams of the semifinals.
This is an IIHF-sanctioned World Championship, meaning all IIHF rules apply. Additionally players with dual citizenship playing in this tournament have locked in their national eligibility.
Players born in 2007 or later are eligible to play in the IIHF World Under-18 Championship. The event is for players under the age of 18. You will see players as young as 15 and sometimes even 14 in this tournament.
NHL Draft eligibles like Porter Martone and James Hagens are not eligible to play in the tournament as they are late 2006 birth years and have exhausted their eligibility. Both played in each of the last two Under-18 World events.
Additionally, Hockey Canada selects only players whose season has already concluded. So players like Gavin McKenna, last year’s MVP for Canada, are not available for selection because their CHL teams are still active in the playoffs.
There are a couple of reasons the U18s is an important tournament. For one, it is a measuring stick among the participating nations to see where everyone is in the age group. It’s an excellent precursor to the World Junior Championship, though results from U18s are usually not translatable to the WJC.
Additionally, this is one of the most heavily scouted events on the NHL Draft calendar. There’s a large collection of top players to be scouted for this year’s selections, but it’s also a great preview of the classes to come in the next two years.
The event is attended by upwards of 300 NHL personnel, plus junior and college scouts seeking import players to add to their teams. It is not uncommon to see a dozen or more NHL GMs in the building to scout some on their own.
At its core, however, it is the first opportunity for players to compete in an IIHF World Championship event. The experience gained here can be something players carry with them to the World Juniors, Men’s Worlds and even the Olympics.
This is by no means a comprehensive list of NHL Draft prospects participating in the tournament, but here is a selection of some of the most notable names to track in the tournament.
In the United States, NHL Network is slated to carry every U.S. game live over the course of the tournament. Other select games may also be broadcast on NHL Network.
In Canada, TSN carries all IIHF events including the U18 World Championship. Every game should be available on one of TSN’s family of networks and streaming on TSN+.
Additionally, the IIHF recently launched its own streaming service, IIHF.tv. Details for what countries the tournament will be available in is here.
The best, and most complete, coverage of the NHL minor league hockey and NHL Draft is found on FloHockey. Don’t miss the latest new prospect guides, rankings and more from Chris Peters and the FloHockey staff.
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