Montreal Canadiens Prospect Kaiden Guhle Could be Heading to Olympics

Montreal Canadiens prospect Kaiden Guhle waited a full year to get revenge at the World Juniors and win an elusive gold medal.

He might get a chance for a gold medal in the near future, but on a much bigger stage.

The 2022 World Juniors were cancelled, or postponed, depending on who you ask. But Guhle’s chances of winning a gold medal were put on pause. It was rumoured the event would return in June or sometime over the summer, but Guhle won’t have to wait that long to compete for his country.

Rumour has it that Guhle is on the short list to represent Canada at the Winter Olympics. Around the time the World Juniors were cancelled, the NHL was in the midst of postponing dozens of games itself. They were supposed to pause for most of February to send players to China to play in the Olympics, but they have taken that off the table and will be rescheduling NHL games during the scheduled time off.

That has opened the door for non-NHL players to play in the Olympics. Canada will be scrambling to put together a roster for the event, but it will be made up of mostly Junior aged players and professionals playing in Europe, as well as a few AHL players.

According to Scott Wheeler of The Athletic, one of those players is Canadiens first round pick Kaiden Guhle.

He does say it is a “long list” and that there are more players to add to this list that already has 24 names on it. He would go on to name five more players, including former Canadiens winger Daniel Carr and Quebec native Jason Demers.

It doesn’t sound like it is a done deal, but Wheeler covers the NHL Draft and prospects in depth for The Athletic so he is certainly a trusted opinion. His list has 29 players on it and some of them, those on two-way NHL-AHL contracts are technically not even eligible to go to the Olympics.

In an interesting twist of fate, it appears Guhle might be trading in his Canada World Junior Jersey for an Olympic size.