The International Ice Hockey Federation said that a women’s world junior hockey championship “will happen, but is at least five years away,” according to Donna Spencer of the CP. Spencer noted a women’s world under-18 championship was added to the IIHF calendar in 2008, but there “isn’t an IIHF tournament between it and the world championship.” USA Hockey Dir of Women’s National Team Programs Katie Million said a junior hockey championship is the “missing piece to our puzzle right now.” Million: “We have our really strong under-18 championship program and women’s worlds, but there’s a span that can be four to six years where we don’t see those players again." Hockey Canada VP/Hockey Operations Gina Kingsbury said with the launch of the PWHL, she thinks it is “even more critical in a lot of ways.” Kingsbury: “You can almost create what the world junior men’s is, a pre-NHL sample for everyone." IIHF women’s committee chair Zsuzsanna Kolbenheyer said that a “lack of money and a shallow player pool in countries outside North America hinder the immediate establishment of a women’s junior tournament.” Kolbenheyer said the U.S. and Canada would “have enough players to play different players,” but “would that be the case for other European countries or Asian countries?” Spencer noted there are 20 players in the women’s world championship in Utica, N.Y., aged 18 or under, and spread across the rosters of Czechia, Switzerland, China, Denmark, Germany, Japan and Sweden (CP, 4/9).
