Canucks defenceman Ethan Bear to play for Team Canada at World Championship

According to Vancouver hockey insider Rick Dhaliwal, Canucks defenceman Ethan Bear will head overseas to play for Team Canada at the 2023 IIHF World Championship in Tampere, Finland and Riga, Latvia.

Bear, 25, last represented Canada on the world stage in 2015 at both the U18 World Junior Championship and the Ivan Hlinka Memorial Tournament. The 2023 Worlds are set to take place between May 12 and 18.

The Canucks acquired Bear from the Carolina Hurricanes on Oct. 28, 2022. The Regina, Sask. product collected three goals and 16 points while averaging 18:32 in 61 games with the Canucks during the 2022–23 regular season.

The Edmonton Oilers originally selected Bear in the fifth round (No. 124 overall) of the 2015 NHL Draft.  The five-foot-eleven defenceman, who shoots right, made his NHL debut with the Oilers in 2017–18.

Bear spent parts of three seasons with the Oilers before being traded to the Hurricanes in exchange for Warren Foegele on July 28, 2021. But after being relegated to a depth role in Carolina, Bear found himself on the move once again just over a year later.

After a successful first season in Vancouver, Bear is set to become a restricted free agent with arbitration rights this summer. The Canucks were on the hook of $1.8 million of his one-year, $2.2 million deal for the 2022–23 season and will have to tender him a $2.2 million qualifying offer to retain his RFA negotiating rights.

Bear is one of six notable RFAs for the Canucks to deal with this summer, alongside Nils Höglander, Akito Hirose, Vitali Kravtsov, Travis Dermott, and Jett Woo. The club already signed pending free agents Christian Wolanin, Guillaume Brisebois, and Phil Di Giuseppe to contract extensions in March.

Through 251 career NHL games over parts of five regular seasons with the Oilers, Hurricanes, and Canucks, Bear has recorded 16 goals, 63 points, and 102 penalty minutes. He was held off the scoreboard through eight playoff contests with the Oilers in 2020 and 2021.