RUSSIA
For Russia, Ivan Provorov will enter his first World Championships, but not the first time he has represented his native country. He was a member of the silver medal winning squads at the IIHF World Junior Championships in 2015 and 2016.
Provorov is coming off his rookie campaign where he was awarded the Barry Ashbee Trophy as the team's Most Outstanding Defenseman. He posted 30 points (6g-24), which finished second among Flyers defensemen, and was the only defenseman on the club to appear in all 82 games.
Provorov also led the team in time-on-ice, averaging nearly 22 minutes per-game (21:58) and ranked second among all rookie defensemen in that category.
Four of the five team's that have Flyers on them will be in action on Day 1, highlighted with a showdown between Canada and the Czech Republic at 2 p.m. ET which can be seen on the NHL Network
TOURNAMENT FORMAT
A total of 16 teams are divided into two, eight-team groups in the Preliminary Round.
GROUP A: Russia, United States, Sweden, Slovakia, Germany, Latvia, Denmark & Italy
GROUP B: Canada, Finland, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Belarus, Norway, France & Slovenia
For the games themselves, three points are awarded for the winning team at the end of regulation, while one point is awarded to both teams at the end of regulation time if the game is tied. Teams can then earn an additional point for a win in a 5-minute overtime period, or the Penalty-Shot Shootout, giving them two points.
After the preliminary round is complete, the top-four ranked teams of each group advance to the quarterfinals that will be played cross-over. The first-place team in each preliminary-round group plays the fourth-place team of the other group, while the second-place team plays the third-place team of the other group. The winning teams advance to the semifinals.
The winning teams of the semifinal games advance to the gold medal game while the semi-final losing teams play for bronze.
After a single round-robin series in each group, the top four teams from each group advance to the Playoff Round.
The winner of each Semi-Final game will move onto the Gold Medal Game, while the losers will play in the Bronze Medal Game, all of which are to be played in Cologne, Germany.