2009 IIHF World Championship

Five Panthers players will be representing their countries in Switzerland at this year's IIHF World Championship.

Michael Frolik, Rostislav Olesz, Keith Ballard, Karlis Skrastins and Janis Sprukts will all be playing for their respective nations when the tournament kicks off on Friday.

Like with the World Junior Championsip in January, I'll keep their stats up at the top of the page.

Janis Sprukts will be playing for the Latvian national team for the sixth time in his career. He's played in 31 WC games, scoring two goals and assisting on six others. Along with his eight points, the center has six penalty minutes and no medals to his credit.

Also playing for Latvia, defenseman Karlis Skrastins will make his first appearance on the national team since playing in the Olympics in 2006. Prior to that, he last dressed in a world championship in 2005. He has played in 46 WC games and he has 27 points (13G, 14A). Way back in 1994, Skrastins had three goals and five assists in seven games, and in 2003, three goals and three assists in six games.

Keith Ballard has appeared in two WCs in his career, and this will be his third. He has five assists in twelve career games, along with a hard-to-notice 32 penalty minutes. He played in '07 and in '08, but in both seasons, the United States failed to medal.

This is Rostislav Olesz's second appearance on the men's national team for the World Championships, although he also played for the Czech Republic in the 2006 Winter Olympics. In 2007, his lone WC to date, Olesz scored two goals and had five points in seven games, but the Czechs finished seventh that year.

Last, but not least: Michael Frolik. Frolik will be joining Olesz on the Czech men's team, and this is the rookie's first WC. It will not, however, be the first time he gets to play on a team with Czech legend Jaromir Jagr. The two played together briefly for HC Kladno during what was the NHL lockout. At the time, Frolik was only 16 years old. When Jagr first played for Kladno, he too was only 16. The experience should be phenomenal for the Panthers' top prospect.

Then there are the players that aren't playing. David Booth would have seemed a definite to play for the United States, but along with Craig Anderson, Booth declined the invitation. Understandably apprehensive to risk injury without a contract next season, but very unfortunate that that's the reason he chose not to play.

Jay Bouwmeester is not on Canada's team and even if Stephen Weiss received an invite, he has a bad wrist and wouldn't be playing anyway.

Richard Zednik turned down an invite to play with Slovakia and Ville Peltonen can not play for Finland due to a hand injury.