Montreal Canadiens: Luke Tuch Heading To World Junior Showcase

Montreal Canadiens prospect Luke Tuch is on the short list to be selected for next year’s World Junior team.

The Baldwinsville, New York native had a solid first season at Boston University in 2020-21, though it was cut short by several cancellations and complications brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Tuch scored six goals and five assists for 11 points in 16 NCAA games as a freshman. He previously played for the United States Development Program where he scored 15 goals and 30 points in 47 games during the 2019-20 season.

Tuch was selected by the Montreal Canadiens in the second round of the 2020 NHL Draft. He was the 47th player taken in that draft and the reason is his combination of skill with great size. The 19 year old left winger is listed at 6’2″ and just over 200 pounds.

The younger brother of Alex Tuch, who just fell to the Canadiens in the third round, will head back to Boston University for his first full college season next year. The only possible interruption to next year’s schedule for him would be heading to World Junior camp.

First, the gritty Habs prospect will head to World Junior Summer Showcase. It is an annual event that normally has a field of four including Canada, Sweden and Finland as well as USA. However, Canada has elected not to send a team this year, so the United States will face off with Swedish and Finnish World Junior hopefuls in an exhibition tournament.

That tournament will take place from July 24th – 31st in Plymouth, Michigan and it will feature 11 games in those eight days. USA is going to split into two teams, USA Blue and USA White, to maximize the number of games that can be played.

This is why they invited such a large group of players to the event. There will be 44 American players heading to the camp, including 24 forwards. Tuch will have to be at his best to stand out amongst that crowd, although there are only three forwards, Matt Beniers, Landon Slaggert and Brett Berard, who are returning from last year’s gold medal winning team.

It is still a month off, and we have Montreal Canadiens Stanley Cup Final games to watch before then, but this will be an interesting offseason tournament to keep an eye on.