Red Wings’ Raymond, Seider Named as Early Olympians

Lucas Raymond (Sweden) and Moritz Seider (Germany) are both clearly in the conversation for the unofficial title of being one of the top hockey players from their respective countries.

That was reinforced Monday when Raymond was named one of Sweden’s six early selections to the country’s national team for the 2026 Olympics and Seider received the same honor for the German team.

This will the first time NHL players will compete at the Olympics since 2014 in Sochi, Russia. The 2026 Olympics will be held in Milan and Cortina, Italy from Feb. 11 to Feb. 22.

Sweden’s first six selections are Raymond, Rasmus Dahlin, Victor Hedman, William Nylander, Gabriel Landeskog and Adrian Kempe. Raymond has been a member of Team Sweden for the last three World Championships, and this year he posted 11 points in 10 games to help Sweden win the bronze medal.

Raymond had a shorthanded goal in a 6-2 win against Denmark in the bronze medal game.  He joined Sweden after posting a career-high 80 points for the Red Wings.

Seider joins Leon Draisaitl, Tim Stutzle, Lukas Reichel, Nico Sturm and Philipp Grubauer in the German squad. Seider, 24, has played for Germany on five different World Championships. He helped the Germans win a silver at the 2023 tournament. He was team captain at this year’s tourney.

Dylan Larkin and Patrick Kane are both considered candidates for the U.S. Olympic team, but neither was selected as one of the early choices. The early U.S. Olympians were Brady and Matthew Tkachuk, Auston Matthews, Quinn Hughes, Jack Eichel and Charlie McAvoy.

Former Red Wings forward Tomas Tatar was among Slovakia’s six selections.