Chloe Primerano continues to be ahead of her time.
She’s answered the bell at higher levels of hockey in recent months and has the chance to do it again.
At 18 years three months, Primerano will be the youngest defender to play for Canada at a women’s world championship since Cheryl Pounder in 1994.
The 10-country tournament opens Wednesday in Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic, but Canada doesn’t start defence of its gold medal until Thursday against Finland at 1 p.m. ET.
Hayley Wickenheiser at 15 years four months in 1994 was the youngest player ever for Canada in a world championship.
Primerano’s standout tournaments in back-to-back world under-18 championships sandwiched a memorable three-game stint with the national team last fall in the Rivalry Series against the United States.
So, competing with the likes of Marie-Philip Poulin and against Hilary Knight in the Czech Republic won’t feel foreign for the teenager from North Vancouver, B.C.
“I feel like I’m ready,” Primerano said. “I’m surrounded by pretty amazing players and a great team, so I know they’re going to set me up pretty well, and it’s going to be awesome.
“It’s pretty special, just being able to play on this team with my idols. I’m really excited, and I can’t wait to play with everyone again.”
She captained Canada to a gold medal in January’s under-18 championship and was named the tournament’s top defender by the IIHF directorate. Her 16 points in eight games as an underage player in 2024 was an under-18 tournament record.
Experience representing country
Primerano played the first three games of the national team’s Rivalry Series against the U.S. in November. At 17, she was the only Canadian to score in the shootout of a 5-4 win in West Valley City, Utah, that evened the series 1-1.
In the Czech Republic, she dons the Maple Leaf a fourth time in less than a year and a half, and in a field that includes almost 60 battle-hardened pros from the Professional Women’s Hockey League.
“We’ve always been a little bit on the conservative side of bringing someone as young as Chloe is to the senior level,” Canada’s general manager Gina Kingsbury said.
“For Chloe, we brought her to the Rivalry Series, we’ve had her in our environment and she’s a pretty exceptional athlete that’s ready for that jump.
“She’s a great skater, she sees the game extremely well, she brings all the attributes that are valuable at that level already. She makes us better. It’s not a matter of developing or looking at the future. We think she can come in and impact our success and impact our team.”
Said head coach Troy Ryan: “There’s a high level of skill there. There’s a confidence greater than her years.”
In addition to her exploits for Canada, Primerano hit the ground running in her University of Minnesota freshman year.
She scored in her debut against the University of Connecticut and assisted on an OT winner the next day against the Huskies.
After five goals, 26 assists and a Frozen Four appearance with the Golden Gophers, Primerano was named to the NCAA’s all-rookie team.
“She chose to come to college a year early,” Minnesota head coach Brad Frost said.
‘Incredible passion for the game’
“Playing against players who are five, six years older than her at times, really from Day 1 we knew that Chloe was going to be more than OK. Even though she was younger, she’s got an incredible passion for the game, very smart hockey player, and somebody that was ready for the bigger moments and ready for the higher pace of play.”
Former Canadian team forward Vicky Sunohara, who coached Primerano at both under 18-championships, said Primerano took a lot on her own shoulders the first year and then blossomed into a leader of women in the second.
“This year, she probably had the same pressure and the pressure of being captain, but she was able to handle that better, really help her teammates, whether it was communication on the ice or off the ice, speaking up in meetings and having a calming voice,” Sunohara said.
“She sounds shy, but she’s never afraid to put up her hand or to share her opinion and be vulnerable in front of a group. Her vulnerability was really noticed and really appreciated among her peers and the players.”
Primerano followed her brother Luca into hockey at the North Shore Winter Club.
She played two seasons on the Burnaby Winter Club’s under-15 boys’ team before joining the Rink Hockey Academy’s women’s under-18 program in Kelowna, B.C.
“Her vision and her agility, her lateral movement, that puck stays on her stick,” Sunohara said. “That probably comes from playing a lot of guys’ hockey with hitting. She goes at top speed with her head up.
Lone female taken in CHL draft
“That’s important now as she’s playing against bigger, stronger, faster players.”
Hockey culture constantly heralds “the next one.” Primerano had that spotlight in the women’s game swung on her when she was only female skater to be chosen in a Canadian Hockey League draft by the Vancouver Giants (268th) in 2022.
Ryan winces a bit when he hears Primerano called the next Poulin because he feels that’s overbearing for a player still in the early bud of her career.
“It’s the best and the worst thing,” Ryan said. “It’s so much to put on a player at that age. It’s a great compliment. Hopefully she can manage it, but it’s also not fair in a way. Let’s talk in 20 years’ time.”
Primerano has a head start on making those years count.
“I feel like going to this world championship, I’m going to be a sponge and soak it all up,” she said.
