Pool A: Canada & Hungary

Author's Note: This is the first of a four-part series. I'll cover two teams per piece who are in the same Pool, in alphabetical order. That’s why you’re seeing the odd pairing of Canada and Hungary to start, and the series will make a bit more sense from there.

The new year is upon us which means two things: resolutions that last a week and the IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship is back on our screens, from January 10th to January 18th. To start off, I will say that if your resolution is to watch more hockey, then the U18 Worlds are appointment viewing. For one, it’s the future of the sport looking to make names for themselves and show they'll bring their country victory.

If you’re thinking that these U18 players won’t be making an impact any time soon with their senior national team, I will urge you to reconsider. Caitlin Kraemer played in the 2024 U18 Worlds and Chloe Primerano was at the 2025 tournament, and both are looking to earn Olympic roster spots in the coming days. Nela Lopušanová played with the Slovakia senior national team last year, taking part in Olympic Qualifiers and the D1A World Championships.

The other reason to watch is its great hockey, and dare I say, in terms of entertainment, it's on par with IIHF Women’s World Championships? A big claim, I know, but consider that in two of the last three U18 Worlds, the Gold Medal Game has not been Canada versus the USA. It was almost three for three, as last tournament the USA eked out a 2-1 victory over Sweden and Canada had to come from behind to beat the Czechs 4-2. That’s just been the way this tournament has gone, and it’s hard to imagine it changing.

These are some of the most competitive games the international stage has to offer. Yes, there are blowouts, but every tournament has those. What the people want are knockout games that have stakes and maybe some potential upsets in the round robin. That’s the U18 Worlds for you.

Canada

Starting off this preview is Team Canada, the reigning Gold Medalists. They've won three of the past four tournaments, and they’re looking to go back-to-back for the first time since they last did it in the 2022 and 2023 tournaments. Canada is one of the two heavier favourites, along with the USA, though this time their roster will look vastly different than the past three tournaments. There’s no obvious star on the roster like they had in Caitlin Kraemer or Chloe Primerano. That’s not to say one won’t show themselves like Kraemer did, but we’re not looking at a team that’s coming into the tournament like the 2024 or 2025 team did. For now, the entire team will be sharing the spotlight until someone emerges.

Forwards

Last year the team already had Primerano, and then Stryker Zablocki showed up in a big way. Zablocki led the 2025 U18 Worlds in goals, with eight in six games. She’s not coming back, so Canada is looking for a new leading goal scorer. Among the obvious candidates are the seven returning forwards from 2025: Rosalie Tremblay, Caileigh Tillier, Rachel Piggot, Hayley McDonald, Maddie McCollough, Alida Korte, and Sofia Ismael. The two names that stick out immediately are Tremblay and McCollough. At Hockey Canada's 2025 U18 Women's National Championship in November, Tremblay went off with six goals and four assists in six games to lead Team Québec to its first ever U18 Nationals Gold Medal.

McCollough is no slouch in that category either: she had four goals at U18 Nationals and has 33 goals in 30 games at the Ontario Women's Hockey League U22 elite level, good enough to lead the league in goals. For context, the OWHL U22 features 12 members of this Team Canada roster. There’s lots of potentially great goal scorers for Canada, but going over all of them would take up the whole article. So I’ll just pick a third player out of the returning ones to be one of Canada’s biggest goal scoring threats: Caileigh Tillier. She’s racked up a decent resume so far, with four goals and six assists at the 2025 U18 Worlds to go along with her 22 goals in 21 OWHL U22 games this season. She has some experience at scoring in important moments for Canada, as she had the third goal for Canada in the semi-final against Czechia and the first goal against the USA in the Gold Medal Game.

As I mentioned previously, this is a U18 Worlds roster, and players come out of nowhere in their first appearance to crush it. The Canadian roster is usually filled with potentially great players wanting to put their names on the map and this roster is no different. If you haven’t seen the hype for her already, you’re going to see why Arianna Milani has been getting praise so early on in her career. She might be the best purely talent player on the roster. She needs to put that talent together in a very short period of time, but she has what it takes to be that player for Canada. Another player to look for is Kendall Doiron. At the U18 Nationals, we saw Team Atlantic make the gold medal game in surprising fashion, and a huge reason why was Doiron, with her five goals and three assists in six games. If she gets to be in an offensive role, it’s going to be an exciting time for Canadian fans.

Defenders

On defence, Canada will be looking for their next star (or stars). Only two returnees who won gold in 2025 are coming back: Kate Viel and Anais Leprohon. Canada will lean on them this go around, but that’s not to say they’ll be the best blueliners for Canada at this tournament. With Viel, the good is simple: she just has to be a very good two-way presence on the blueline for Canada in the mold of Ava Murphy or Avery Pickering. Eat up minutes, get the puck moving up the ice, and don’t make mistakes in your own zone. When it comes to Leprohon, the expectations are that she’s going to push the envelope offensively. She had two goals at the 2025 U18 Worlds and had six assists in six games at the U18 Nationals with gold medal winners Team Québec.

Out of the new players on the roster, two stick out as players who can make a big impact and not replace what Primerano brought to the blueline but at least close the gap. Those two blueliners are Chelsea Tillier and Megan Mossey. With Vicki Sunohara back as head coach, it’s clear Canada is going back to the well with last year's strategy on the backend, with puck-moving blueliners being key to constantly moving the puck up the ice. Tillier is very much in that mold and has been on fire this season for the Burlington Barracudas with 27 points in 25 games. Tillier's also got a lot of assists, with 24.

Among everyone on the blueline. I fully believe Megan Mossey is about to show that, while she's not the next Primerano, she's closer than people realize. The Prince Edward Island native is putting up video game numbers in the OWHL U22 league. Last season, she had 23 goals in 37 games, and so far this season, she's at 25 goals in 30 games. Mossey was also a huge part of Team Atlantic making the U18 Nationals Final, with three goals and three assists in six games. She’s a very good skater, has great size, and is quite gifted offensively. She has all the tools and resume necessary to start making her trek towards Canada’s senior national team in due time.

Goalies

While Canada has recently been keeping up a pattern of bringing at least one goalie to U18 Worlds even as the third goalie just so that they'll have the experience of having been at the tournament in some way, they didn’t do that for the 2025 tournament. That leaves Canada with three goalies with zero experience on the international stage in Léa-Rose Charrois, Maija St-Pierre, and Rowan Houweling. This is about as blind as you can be going into a tournament, which isn’t always a bad thing. All three goalies are rather talented and have very good resumes.

Rowan Houweling didn’t have a great showing at U18 Nationals. However, Houweling plays out of Shattuck St. Mary’s and shares the net with someone you may remember from last year's U18 Worlds: Morgan Stickney. At St. Mary’s, Stickney has a 0.942 save percentage and Houweling a 0.946 save percentage, so at the very least, Houweling is showing she can keep up with Team USA’s best goalie. Two goalies who did have great tournaments at U18 Nationals were Charrois and St-Pierre, who finished top two in tournament save percentage. Charrois was instrumental in getting Québec its first ever ġold medal, and St-Pierre was the goalie who upset Ontario-Red in the Bronze Medal Game. If I were a bettor. I’d say Charrois starts as the number one goalie, but St-Pierre will get time to prove herself as well.

The expectation with Canada is always gold and this year is no different. It shouldn’t be different either, as Canada is bringing a very talented roster with a veteran forward corps and the type of blueline that was successful last time around. This will probably be closer to the usual Canadian roster, where no one sets records but they’re very productive and should overwhelm other teams with their depth. We’ve seen better teams lose before, though, so as always with hockey, who knows what happens.

Hungary

If you hadn’t noticed recently, the Hungarian women’s hockey program has been on the rise. Their senior national team was promoted in 2019 and finally got on the ice at the IIHF Women’s World Championship in 2021. They’ve been up and down, but that’s better than just being down. They need some youth to inject into the program and help them become more of a mainstay at the senior international level. For the first time since 2014, the Hungarian U18 women’s team will be appearing at the IIHF U18 Women’s World Championships.

After treading water in the U18 Division 1A Championships with three third-place finishes and a few fourth-place finishes recently, Hungary finally found their group to propel the team into the top division. They won all five of their games in regulation, and in dominant fashion too. They scored 13 goals and only allowed two against. Now the goal is staying among the top division, which can be a difficult task, especially when your Pool contains Canada, Sweden, and Switzerland. Their realistic hope is to get a win versus Switzerland or risk having to face one of Finland, Czechia, or Slovakia, depending on how Pool B shakes out.

Forwards

One of the big problems these recently promoted teams face is that they’ll get promoted on the backs of their U18 players who then graduate, leaving the recently promoted team without their best players who got them here. For Hungary's forwards, this actually isn’t a problem. Réka Hiezl, Petra Polónyi, and Krisztina Weiler were their top-producing forwards at the 2025 U18 D1A Worlds, with all coming back for the 2026 U18 Worlds. If Hungary is to stay in the top group, they need these three to be their best players once again.

Let’s be honest, it’s going to be an uphill battle for Hungary to stay in the top division. The resume each of these forwards bring, though, gives hope they can avoid relegation. Réka Hiezl especially is the one player that we're looking at and thinking we might be seeing our first Hungarian women’s hockey star. Hungary has produced some respectable players, which is why they’ve made it to the senior top division but have yet to have someone who is just far and away the best player on the team. Hiezl could be it.

At only 16 years old, Hiezl has amassed an impressive U18 international resume already. In the two U18 D1A Worlds Hiezl has played in, she’s put up 11 points in 10 games. This year, she’s made the jump to North America and hasn't stopped being productive. She joined Shattuck-St. Mary’s U19 AAA team and leads the team in points, with 61 points in 29 games. What might be even more impressive is that Hiezl is already committed to Quinnipiac University, which is a great NCAA hockey program that should turn her into a complete player.

Hiezl isn’t alone in her trek to North America to further her hockey career. Fellow longtime U18 national team member Krisztina Weiler has been in North America for two seasons now with the OHA Mavericks playing in the OWHL, where a decent portion of the U18 Canadian national team plays. This is her first season at the OWHL U22 level and has a respectable 10 goals in 23 games. The cherry on top is Weiler is also committed to playing in the NCAA and will do so with Lindenwood University. Rounding out the trio is Petra Polónyi, who spent two seasons with the OHA Mavericks program and is now with the NAHA program who has seen Tessa Janecke as well as Caroline Harvey pass through it. For non-North American based Hungarian players, keep an eye on Hanna Lili Zsobrak.

Defenders

Much to the dismay of the Hungarian coaching staff I’m sure, Boglárka Báhiczki-Tóth has aged out of the U18 program. They’re hoping someone can step into the big skates she’s leaving behind. Báhiczki-Tóth led the U18 team in points at the 2025 U18 D1A Worlds, with six points in five games, and been consistently productive in years before this. Luckily for Hungary, their second-highest scoring blueliner is coming back in Bonito Szabo, who had four points in five 2025 U18 D1A Worlds games.

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Szabo is very interesting. On paper, her numbers don’t stick out at all. What does stick out is she’s been playing hockey in Switzerland—and not just in Switzerland, but in the Rheintal Future men’s program. That program plays in the top U18 Swiss league and has seen their alumni excel in the Swiss top men’s league, the National League. It's potentially a great development opportunity for her. As for help on the blueline, I think Szabo and the Hungarian coaching staff will be looking to Lili Hajdu to shore up the blueline. Hajdu has been part of the U18 Hungarian national team for three years now and made her senior team debut at 2025 Worlds and Olympic Qualifiers.

Goalies

You’d think picking out the starting goalie for the Hungarian U18 national team would be difficult, considering who has enough knowledge of Hungarian hockey to know who is on the rise. Thankfully Hungary’s U18 national team starter from last year is back in Noémi Zoé Takács. She’s been on the U18 national team program for three years and this will be her fourth.

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At the 2025 U18 D1A Worlds, Takács posted a 0.969 save percentage in three games and earned a spot on the Hungarian senior national team at the 2025 Worlds. If Takács can't be the goalie Hungary needs her to be, it looks as though Csenge Csordas is potentially going to be up to the challenge. Standing at 5’ 10”, Csordas was on the U18 national team last year and has been very good in her limited time in the Austrian women’s league, currently holding a 0.963 save percentage in three games.

This is going to be an interesting tournament for Hungary. Expectations right now are below the earth's crust, because typically, promoted teams get relegated almost immediately. Looking at how this tournament will most likely play out, Hungary will either be playing Slovakia or Finland. So they'll either play a Finnish team that has too much depth for Hungary to contend with, or Nela Lopušanová in a relegation game where she’s so far refused to let Slovakia be relegated. As unfair as it seems, if Hungary wants to avoid relegation, they need Réka Hiezl to become the first Hungarian women’s hockey star.