Calgary, Edmonton and Prague to host 2028 World Cup of Hockey

It’s official. Calgary and Edmonton have been chosen, along with the Czech Republic capital city of Prague, as the host cities for the World Cup of Hockey in 2028.

The NHL made the announcement on Monday in a social media post featuring messages from NHL superstars Cale Makar, who was born in Calgary, along with Edmonton Oilers’ captain Connor McDavid and David Pastrnak, who is from the Czech Republic and plays for the Boston Bruins.

“I’m excited to announce that the 2028 World Cup of Hockey is coming to my very own hometown, Calgary, Alberta,” said Makar in a message posted on the social media platform X.

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The event, featuring eight of the top hockey nations in the world in a best-on-best tournament, will take place in February 2028.

Calgary and Prague will host the round-robin games, while the semi-finals and finals will be played at Rogers Place in Edmonton.

“I’m absolutely thrilled to announce that the semifinals and finals of the 2028 World Cup of Hockey will take place in Edmonton, Alberta,” said McDavid in the social media post.

The tournament made its debut in 1996 and was last played in 2016 in Toronto, when Canada won.

The announcement of the World Cup’s return comes two weeks after NHL commissioner Gary Bettman visited Calgary to tour the construction site of Scotia Place, which is part of Calgary’s new $1.2 billion events centre development, that will serve as the new home for the NHL’s Calgary Flames.

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During his visit to the city, Bettman described the joint bid by Calgary and Edmonton as “a good bid” that “people could be very proud of.”

“So we did initially submit our bids separately, as was requested by the NHL and the NHLPA,” said Alisha Reynolds, president of Tourism Calgary.

“But we put in something at the bottom of our bids that we call a love note, which was a comment that if there were an appetite to consider a joint bid that would create more movement, more economic impact, and more community engagement between two destinations — that we would love to take next steps in a conversation about that joint bid.”

“What came back to us fairly promptly was they loved the idea and that they wanted to explore a partnership between Edmonton and Calgary.”

Organizers estimate the tournament will generate $375 million in economic impact for Alberta, help fill nearly 172,00 hotel rooms and support more than 43,000 jobs.

Plans call for Calgary to host a total of seven games at Scotia Place, including six round-robin and one elimination game.

The Flames’ new arena is scheduled to be completed in fall 2027 and is expected to seat about 18,400 people.

Edmonton will play host to two semifinal games and the championship game at Rogers Place, which has a capacity of 18,347 for hockey.

The CEO of Roger’s Place, Stu Ballantyne, said the two Alberta cities were amongst “many” bidding to host the tournament.

“We never were exactly sure how many NHL teams were bidding on it for the North American tournaments. (But) a lot of the NBA cities were not able to to give up the time because if you have hosted the entire tournament it’s about a 20-day commitment from the arena. So we are still, to this day, not sure how many we (were) competing with, but we’re happy to have won,” Ballantyne added.

The participating countries, along with ticket information and other tournament details will be announced at a later date.

Fans who are interested in purchasing tickets are being asked to fill out an “interest form” on the tournament’s official website.

— With files from The Canadian Press

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