Marc-Andre Fleury to join Canada for 2025 World Championship

Flower is going to have one final rendezvous.

On Monday, it was announced that Minnesota Wild goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury has accepted his invitation to join Team Canada at the 2025 IIHF Men’s World Championship.

Fleury’s longtime agent, Allan Walsh, broke the news.

Fleury was made available to join the Canadian squad after the Wild were knocked out of the opening round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs by the Vegas Golden Knights. The veteran netminder appeared in just one game in the series, coming in relief for Filip Gustavsson in Game 5, giving up the game-winning goal in overtime.

The Wild would lose the series in six games.

Fleury’s decision to join his countryman in Sweden is notable for a couple of reasons. This is the first time he will play for Canada since he was the third-stringer behind the Hockey Hall of Famers Roberto Luongo and Martin Brodeur at the 2010 Winter Olympics, in which Team Canada took home gold in Vancouver.

Second, the world championship will be the 40-year-old’s final board of call in hockey. Fleury previously announced the 2024-25 season will be his last in the NHL.

Fleury joins New York Rangers prospect Dylan Garand as the two listed netminders on the Canadian roster. With that, the Sorel, Quebec native will join former teammate and Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby, who is joining Canada’s world championship roster for the first time since 2015.

Fleury and Crosby were on the Penguins team from Crosby’s introduction to the NHL in 2005 to when Fleury was taken by the Golden Knights in the 2017 expansion draft. Together, they won three Stanley Cups in Pittsburgh, as well as being on the legendary 2010 Olympic roster.

Along with the gold medal in Vancouver, Fleury took home the silver medal twice at the IIHF World Junior Championship in 2003 and 2004.

Fleury ended his NHL career second in games played (1,051) and wins (575), only trailing Brodeur. He is also tied for 10th all-time with 76 shutouts.

Canada opens up its Group A schedule this Saturday in Stockholm, taking on Slovenia.