A 15-year-old Swiss player sneaks into the World Junior Championship!

While you were probably eating, drinking and celebrating the holiday season yesterday, others were getting ready for what could be the most important event of their lives. Many young men are focused on the World Junior Championship, which will take place from December 26 to January 5, looking for the opportunity to showcase their talents and get the attention of professional scouts.

The tournament returns to Ottawa after it was last hosted in the Canadian capital city in 2009. This will be the 19th time Canada has hosted the WJC and the fourth time in six years.

Team Canada unveils its roster two weeks ago, with forward Porter Martone, goaltender Jack Ivankovic of the Brampton Steelheads and Erie Otters defenceman Matthew Schaefer, who are all 2025 draft-eligible.

And one awesome detail about this year’s tournament is that a player under the age of 16 will take part in the World Junior Championship for the first time in more than two decades.

Right before Christmas, Jonah Neuenschwander made the roster of Team Switzerland. The 15-year-old forward will be the first player of his age to play in the under-20 event since Andrei Kostitsyn and Konstanin Zakharov played up front for Belarus and Viktor Alexandrov did the same for Kazakhstan in 2001.

The only other 15-year-old in world junior history was Belarus goaltender Vitali Aristov in 1999.

Listed at 6-foot-3 and 181 lbs, Neuenschwander has mostly played for Swiss National League club Biel-Bienne’s under-20 team this season, recording 11 goals and 13 assists over 26 games. He’s also played five contests with the senior squad, posting just one assists. In 40 games with Beil-Bienne’s under-17 side in 2023-24, the teenager put up 20 goals and 12 apples.

Neuenschwander won’t be eligible for the NHL draft until 2027.

That’s one of the great stories from this year’s World Junior Championship.