ST. CLOUD, Minn. — For the first time, the St. Cloud State men's hockey team will have ties to three players competing in the IIHF World Junior Championships.
The tournament, which gathers the top Under-20 talent in the world from qualifying countries, will take place Dec. 26-Jan. 5 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Moncton, New Brunswick.
St. Cloud State defenseman Jack Peart has played on the top defensive pairing with Michigan's Luke Hughes for Team USA in its two pre-tournament games. Peart, a sophomore from Grand Rapids, Minn., was a member of Team USA in the 2022 World Junior Championships.
A second-round draft pick of the Minnesota Wild, Peart's play has taken a step forward this season. He is running the Huskies' top power-play unit and has 13 assists, 15 points, 20 blocked shots, 10 penalty minutes and is a plus-10 in 18 games. As a freshman, Peart had 15 assists, 17 points, 24 penalty minutes, 20 blocked shots and was a plus-3 in 32 games.
Peart is the third SCSU player to play for Team USA in two World Junior Championships (Mark Parrish, 1996, 1997; Ryan Poehling, 2018, 2019).
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Recruits will play for Latvia, Finland
Peart is not the lone player with ties to St. Cloud State who will play in the tournament.
Forward Martins Lavins will play for Latvia and forward Verner Miettinen will play for Finland in the tournament. Lavins and Miettinen have both signed National Letters of Intent to play for the Huskies.
Lavins, a 19-year-old from Riga, Latvia, is playing in his second season of juniors for the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders in the United States Hockey League. Lavins has four goals, 11 points, 25 penalty minutes and is even in plus/minus in 18 games this season. He is averaging 16 minutes, 42 seconds per game, is winning 52% of his puck battles and 56% of his faceoffs for the RoughRiders. This will be the second World Junior Championships for Lavins, who is listed at 6-foot and 185 pounds.
Miettinen, a 19-year-old from Espoo, Finland, is playing his first season of juniors for the Fargo Force in the USHL. Miettinen has seven goals, 14 points, five power-play goals, four penalty minutes and is a plus-5 in 18 games. Prior to this season, he played three seasons for a junior team in Finland (Kiekko-Espoo). Miettinen is listed at 6-foot and 160 pounds, is averaging 15:52 per game and is winning 56% of his puck battles and 54% of his faceoffs. Miettinen is the younger brother of Veeti Miettinen, who is a junior forward for the Huskies .
This is the first time that the Huskies have had ties to three players in the tournament in one year. The previous most was two (1996 — Matt Cullen and Parrish, USA; 2018 — David Hrenak, Slovakia, and Poehling, USA).
A full schedule of the tournament can be found here .
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Huskies on USA World Juniors roster
- 1991 — defenseman Tony Burns
- 1996 — forward Matt Cullen
- 1996, 1997 — forward Mark Parrish
- 2003 — goalie Bobby Goepfert
- 2006 — defenseman Casey Borer
- 2010 — goalie Mike Lee
- 2012 — defenseman Kevin Gravel
- 2016 — defenseman Will Borgen
- 2017 — defenseman Jack Ahcan
- 2018, 2019 — forward Ryan Poehling
- 2022, 2023 — defenseman Jack Peart
Huskies from other countries to play in World Juniors
- 1999 — forward Peter Szabo (Slovakia)
- 2004 — forward Andreas Nodl (Austria)
- 2008 — defenseman Oliver Lauridsen (Denmark)
- 2015 — defenseman Mika Ilvonen (Finland)
- 2018 — goalie David Hrenak (Slovakia)
- 2022 — forward Martins Lavins (Latvia)
- 2023 — forward Verner Miettinen (Finland), forward Martins Lavins (Latvia)
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