U18 Women’s Worlds Preview: Canada vs. Finland
Troy Ryan, Kori Cheverie and Tara Watchorn to guide nationwide groups throughout 2023-24 season
CALGARY, Alta. –Hockey Canada
has unveiled the teaching staffs for Canada’s National Women’s Team,
Canada’s National Women’s Development Team and Canada’s National Women’s
Under-18 Team for the 2023-24 season, with seven alumnae amongst these behind
the bench.
Troy Ryan (Spryfield, NS) returns for his fourth 12 months
behind the bench as head coach of Canada’s National Women’s Team, joined by
assistant coaches Kori Cheverie (New Glasgow, NS),
Caroline Ouellette (Montreal, QC/Concordia University, RSEQ)
and Courtney Birchard-Kessel (Mississauga, ON/Boston University, HE),
in addition to goaltending advisor
Brad Kirkwood (Calgary, AB)
and video coach Andrew Boucher (Timmins, ON).
“We’re excited concerning the teaching employees, together with plenty of alumnae, we
have assembled for our ladies’s packages for the upcoming season,” stated
Gina Kingsbury (Rouyn-Noranda, QC), vice-president of
hockey operations. “We are grateful for the dedication lots of our coaches
make to return 12 months after 12 months to guide and develop our athletes, and look
ahead to the management and experience they’ll herald main our
groups on the worldwide stage.”
Ryan not too long ago grew to become the primary coach to serve on the
teaching employees for each Canada’s National Men’s Team and Canada’s National
Women’s Team, successful a gold medal as an assistant on the 2023 IIHF World
Championship and silver as head coach on the 2023 IIHF Women’s World
Championship. Ryan goes into his fifth season as head coach of the
National Women’s Team after serving as an assistant coach for almost 4
seasons (2016-19). Ryan coached Team Canada to back-to-back gold medals at
the IIHF Women’s World Championship (2021, 2022), along with a gold
medal on the 2022 Olympic Winter Games. He additionally earned a silver medal at
the 2018 Olympics, silver Women’s Worlds in 2017 and bronze in 2019.
Cheverie received a silver medal as an assistant coach with
Canada’s National Women’s Team on the 2023 IIHF Women’s World Championship.
She additionally added gold medals as an assistant at Women’s Worlds in 2021 and
2022, and on the 2022 Olympic Winter Games. Cheverie grew to become the primary girl
to serve on the teaching employees with certainly one of Canada’s nationwide males’s groups at
the 2022 IIHF U18 World Championship. Nationally, she received a silver medal as
head coach of Team Nova Scotia on the 2023 Canada Winter Games, the
province’s first-ever medal in ladies’s hockey. She was additionally the primary girl
employed as a full-time assistant coach in U SPORTS with the Ryerson
University males’s hockey group for 5 seasons (2016-21).
Ouellette was not too long ago introduced as an honoured member of
the Hockey Hall of Fame’s Class of 2023. In May, she was additionally inducted into
the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) Hall of Fame. She is
getting into her third season because the affiliate head coach at Concordia
University. Internationally, she received a silver medal as an assistant coach
with Canada’s National Women’s Team on the 2023 IIHF Women’s World
Championship, together with gold in 2022 and bronze in 2019. As a participant, she
received 4 Olympic gold medals and 6 world championships throughout an
illustrious 17-year worldwide profession.
Birchard-Kessel is getting into her first 12 months as an assistant
coach at Boston University. Prior to becoming a member of BU, she spent 4 seasons as
an assistant coach with the Princeton University ladies’s hockey group
(2019-23). She received a gold medal as head coach of Canada’s National Women’s
Under-18 Team on the 2023 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship, and gold as
an assistant at U18 Women’s Worlds in 2019, and has been an assistant with
Canada’s National Women’s Development Team on two events (2017, 2019).
Canada’s National Women’s Team will head to southern Ontario for its Fall
Festival coaching camp from Sept. 10-17, in preparation for the 2023-24
season, which incorporates the Rivalry Series, with dates and areas to be
introduced sooner or later. The season will conclude with the 2024 IIHF
Women’s World Championship, tentatively scheduled for April 2024 in Utica,
New York.
Cheverie returns as head coach of Canada’s National Women’s
Development Team, alongside assistant coaches
Rachel Flanagan (Pontypool, ON/University of Guelph, OUA)
, Noémie Marin (Acton Vale, QC/John Abbott College, CEGEP)
and Cassandra Turner (Campbellford, ON/Quinnipiac University, ECAC),
in addition to goaltending coach
Sheldon Goertzen (Saskatoon, SK/University of Saskatchewan, CW)
and Boucher as video coach.
Flanagan not too long ago accomplished her sixteenth season as head coach of
the University of Guelph ladies’s hockey group. During her tenure, Flanagan
has led the Gryphons to a U SPORTS nationwide title in 2019, along with
three Ontario University Athletics (OUA) titles, and she or he has been named the
OUA Coach of the Year on 5 events. She served as an assistant coach
with Canada’s National Women’s Team throughout the Rivalry Series in December
2022, has served as an assistant with Canada’s National Women’s Development
Team 3 times (2011, 2012, 2022) and was acknowledged as a BFL Female
Coach of the Year in 2020-21.
Marin is getting into her ninth season as the ladies’s hockey
head coach at John Abbott College. She was beforehand the pinnacle coach of
Kuper Academy (2012-14). Marin led the event group as head coach
throughout the 2016-17 season and was an assistant with Canada’s National
Women’s Under-18 Team on the 2015 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship. On
the nationwide stage, she was an assistant with Quebec on the 2015 National
Women’s Under-18 Championship and led Quebec to silver as head coach on the
2019 Canada Winter Games.
Turner is getting into her ninth season as head coach of
Quinnipiac’s ladies’s hockey group, having led the Bobcats to the
quarterfinals of the NCAA event in every of the final two seasons. In
2015-16, her first season as head coach, she led the group to 30 wins, an
NCAA report for wins by a first-year ladies’s hockey head coach. Turner
captured a silver medal as head coach of Canada’s National Women’s Under-18
Team on the 2015 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship, and received gold as an
assistant in 2014.
Following her function as an assistant coach throughout the 2022-23 season,
Tara Watchorn (Newcastle, ON/Boston University, HE) takes
the reins as head coach of Canada’s National Women’s Under-18 Team. She
can be joined by assistant coaches
Stefanie McKeough (Carlsbad Springs, ON/University of Ottawa, OUA)
and
Vicky Sunohara (Scarborough, ON/University of Toronto, OUA)
, in addition to goaltending coach Gord Woodhall
(Winnipeg, MB/Winnipeg, MFHL)
and video coach Stef Thomson (Oshawa, ON)
Watchorn was named head coach of Boston University in April,
turning into the primary alumna of the ladies’s program to function its head
coach. She served as the primary head coach of Stonehill College’s ladies’s
hockey group (2021-23), incomes NEWHA Coach of the Year honours within the
program’s inaugural season. Prior to becoming a member of Stonehill, Watchorn served as
an assistant coach with BU for 4 seasons (2017-20). A 2014 Olympic gold
medallist as a participant, she received back-to-back gold medals as an assistant
coach with Canada’s National Women’s Under-18 Team on the IIHF U18 Women’s
World Championship in 2022 and 2023.
McKeough not too long ago accomplished her third season as an assistant
coach with the University of Ottawa ladies’s hockey group. Prior to becoming a member of
the Gee-Gees, she served as head coach of Göteborg HC of the Svenka
Damhockeyligen (SDHL) in Sweden throughout the 2020 season following two years
as an assistant. As a participant, McKeough received a silver medal with Canada at
the 2009 IIHF World Women’s U18 Championship.
Sunohara is getting into her thirteenth season as head coach of the
University of Toronto ladies’s hockey group, successful each OUA and U SPORTS
Coach of the Year honours in three consecutive seasons (2020-23) and
main the Blues to the OUA championship final spring. She received a gold medal
as an assistant coach on the 2022 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship.
Internationally, Sunohara received two Olympic gold medals along with seven
world championship golds, and ranks tenth in all-time Team Canada scoring
with 119 factors (56-63—119) in 164 profession video games.
Canada’s National Women’s Under-18 Team will collect in St. Catharines,
Ont., for choice camp from Aug. 9-13 prematurely of a three-game collection
in opposition to the United States, Aug. 14-20 in Lake Placid, New York. It will
chase a third-consecutive gold medal on the 2024 IIHF U18 Women’s World
Championship in Switzerland, Jan. 6-14.
For extra info on Hockey Canada and Canada’s National Women’s
Program, please go to
HockeyCanada.ca, or comply with alongside by way of social media on
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