USA Hockey has never experienced back-to-back gold medals at the World Junior Championship. After winning gold in 2024 in Sweden, Team USA will not be reinventing the wheel. In fact, they’re running it back with the entire staff from its championship team led by head coach David Carle at the 2025 IIHF World Junior Championship in Ottawa.

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The 34-year-old is fresh off winning his second NCAA national championship with the University of Denver, leading the Pioneers to its record 10th title in program history. Carle will be joined on the bench by assistant coaches Steve Miller (University of Minnesota), Brett Larson (St. Cloud State University) and Garrett Raboin (Augustana University). David Lassonde (USA Hockey) will return as Team USA’s goalie coach, while Travis Culhane (Denver) will be the video coach for the second straight season.

Carle has become one of the most highly-regarded coaches not currently in the NHL, which has led to widespread speculation that NHL teams are going to be calling on him for his services soon.

Carle taking the USA job certainly doesn’t preclude him from exploring the options that may be available to him at the NHL level as it is likely he will be called on for interviews. David Quinn was named a U.S. World Junior coach before accepting a job with the New York Rangers, which led to him being replaced by Mike Hastings for Team USA in 2019.

That said, Carle recently told the Spittin' Chiclets podcast that he isn't in any rush to lead Denver and has a young family to consider before deciding if and when he will take the next step to the NHL.

USA has gone back to their winning head coach after each of the two previous times they took home gold. Bob Motzko was the coach in both 2017 and 2018, winning gold and then bronze. Nate Leaman took Team USA to gold in the bubble World Juniors in 2021 and they took fifth at the 2022 event.

If the Americans are looking to break the streak, Carle may be one of their best possible options. He has won two NCAA titles in three years and helped a U.S. age group that had struggled to win the big one, get over the hump in Sweden last year.

Team USA will be able to return as many as nine players from last year’s team including the dominant trio of Will Smith (SJS), Ryan Leonard (WSH) and Gabe Perreault (NYR), who are are likely to return to Boston College next season after falling just short in the NCAA finals against Carle’s Pioneers.

Also eligible to return are defensemen Drew Fortescue (NYR), Zeev Buium (2024) and reserve blueliner Aram Minnetian (DAL). Up front, Oliver Moore (CHI), Danny Nelson (NYI), and alternate forward Carey Terrance (ANA) could join Smith, Leonard and Perreault. Trey Augustine (DET) and third goalie Sam Hillebrandt are also age-eligible to play in another World Juniors.

There is good depth in both the 2005 and 2006 birth years to pull from to help round out the team. So expectations for Carle and this group will be high as the Americans look to do something that no previous American team has done – following up one gold with another.

The 2025 World Junior Championship will be held Dec. 26, 2024 to Jan. 5, 2025 in Ottawa. Team USA and Canada will be in the same group, which guarantees at least one matchup between the rivals after the two missed each other in last year's tournament.

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