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Other than that Stanley Cup thingy, the Sedins haven’t much left to prove to anyone, which is why the soon-to-be 36-year-olds are at ease with the strong possibility that this World Cup will be the last time they play for their country.

For this tournament, Henrik Sedin is Sweden’s captain, Daniel one of the assistants.

“We’re not going to come out and say this is our last tournament, but we know that might be the case,” Henrik said Friday in a phone call from Sweden. “When you talk about it, it is a long time and a lot of things have happened between these tournaments. In 2004, we weren’t playing much (for the Canucks). We were second-liners, but we’d play 12 or 13 minutes a night. We didn’t know if our career was going to take off. Then the lockout came and we played one season in Sweden, and then things started to happen for us in Vancouver.”

“I would love to see World Cups or Olympics every two years,” Daniel said. “Or world championships and Olympics. I hope we get a chance to play in the next Olympics. If NHL players get a chance to play there and we’re still healthy and playing well, I wouldn’t say no to another Olympics. Another world championship is more doubtful. We’d be more hesitant for sure.”

Photo by FRANCK FIFE / AFP/Getty Images Files

But another Olympics seems unlikely, both because the Sedins will be 37 when the 2018 Winter Games are staged in South Korea and because the NHL appears to be nearing a tipping point in its strained relationship with the International Ice Hockey Federation — the tail that has wagged the NHL dog and largely dictated terms since the best players in the world returned to the Olympics in 1998.