Team Canada makes Juniors roster cuts, Dach still on squad

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Hockey Canada announced Thursday that seven players had been released from the National Juniors team, and Blackhawks center Kirby Dach was not among them. In fact, one report says that the Blackhawks have told Team Canada that Dach can stick with the national team as long as he doesn’t miss any regular season NHL games.

Back in October, when the Blackhawks initially loaned Dach to Team Canada, there was some question as to whether Dach would have to leave early. The 2021 IIHF World Junior Championship tournament runs from Dec. 25 to Jan. 5, and early reports indicated that the NHL was targeting a Jan. 1 start date. But new reports suggest the league now has its sights set on a Jan. 13 start date. Nothing is official yet, so it’s hard to say exactly whether Dach will be able to play in the whole World Juniors tourney, or not.

One man who certainly wants Dach to stick around is Team Canada World Juniors head coach Andre Tourigny.

“They make it tough for us to break up right now,” Tourigny said Wednesday when discussing Dach’s line with Dylan Cozens and Connor McMichael. “We’ll keep going with that. That’s something we envision can be a really good line moving forward. We’ll see how the rest of the lineup unfolds, but that’s a good option for us.”

Canada won the gold medal at last year’s World Juniors tournament, but Dach wasn’t on the roster as he was playing for the Blackhawks at the time.

Dach was impressive in his rookie campaign for the Blackhawks, notching eight goals and 15 assists in 64 games. He chipped in a goal and five assists in the playoffs as well.

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