CALGARY, Alta. – Canada’s National Women’s Under-18 Team will be heading to Russia with gold on its radar this January.

Hockey Canada has announced the 23-player roster that will wear the red-and-white in Dmitrov, Russia, Jan. 6-13, at the 2018 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship – including four players who were part of the 2017 squad that took home silver (Fillier, McQuigge, Veillette, Vorster).

The player selections were made by Melody Davidson, Hockey Canada’s general manager of national women’s team programs, alongside the team’s coaching staff – head coach Delaney Collins (Pilot Mound, Man./Fraser Valley, FMAAA), assistant coaches Amanda Benoit-Wark (Welland, Ont./Ridley College, CAHS) and Darren Turcotte (North Bay, Ont./Nipissing University, OUA), and goaltending consultant Joe Johnston (Lower Sackville, N.S./Dalhousie University, AUS) - and with input from Hockey Canada’s regional scouts.

“We’ve had an opportunity to evaluate a very large pool of talent in this age group through our summer camps, with their club teams this season, and at the U18 national championship in Quebec City, and these 23 players have exhibited the on- and off-ice qualities we are looking for to represent Canada,” said Collins, a national team alumna who was an assistant coach with Canada’s 2015 and 2017 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship teams. “We have four players who bring not only their hockey talent, but also their experience from last year’s world championship to this team, and we are really excited about the energy we’ve seen from all 23 players.”

The roster, consisting of three goaltenders, seven defencemen, and 13 forwards, also includes:

• 18 players who competed as part of Canada’s National Women’s Under-18 Team in a three-game series against the United States in Lake Placid, N.Y., last August (Adzija, Boyd, Connors, Dalton, Fillier, Forcey, Gosling, Guay, Kirwan, MacEachern, McArthur, McQuigge, Moloughney, Parker, Slobodzian, Veillette, Vorster, Woodland);
• Seven players who won gold with Ontario Red at the 2017 National Women’s Under-18 Championship in Quebec City in November (Adzija, Boyd, Dalton, Fillier, MacEachern, McArthur, Moloughney); and
• Five players who will make their debut with Canada’s National Under-18 Team (Angers, Correia, Hoskin, Kollman, Rickwood).

Canada will open its 2018 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship against the host Russians on Jan. 6 at 7:30 a.m. ET/4:30 a.m. PT. The schedule also has the Canadians facing Sweden and the United States in preliminary-round action, Jan. 7 and 9 respectively, before the tournament culminates with the gold-medal game at 11:30 a.m. ET/8:30 a.m. PT on Saturday, Jan. 13. Hockey Canada’s broadcast partner, TSN, is slated to carry the gold-medal game from Dmitrov – check local listings for details.

The Canadian team will be looking to secure its first gold medal at the IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship since 2014, having won gold four times (2010, 2012, 2013, 2014), and silver six times since the event’s inception in 2008.

For more information on Hockey Canada and Canada’s National Women’s Team Program, please visit HockeyCanada.ca, or follow through social media on Facebook, Twitter, and Twitter.com/HC_Women.