The top of the podium has proven an elusive goal for Canada the past five years at the International Ice Hockey Federation world junior championships.
Now defenceman Joe Hicketts, of the Victoria Royals, and his 2015 Canadian teammates will try to do over the holiday season what none have done since Jamie Benn of Central Saanich helped lead Canada to gold in 2009 at Ottawa, a junior precursor to Benn’s gold medal at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.
Tyson Barrie of Victoria, a mobile puck-moving blueliner whom Hicketts greatly resembles in style, and Port Hardy-raised Campbell River-native Brett Connolly were the last Island-associated players to win a medal at the world junior championships when they garnered silver in 2011 despite leading Russia 3-0 heading into the third period of the gold-medal game in Buffalo.
They continued a long tradition of Island players at the world junior championships, extending back to when Mel Bridgman of Victoria and Esquimalt’s late Rick Lapointe augmented their blockbuster WHL season with the Victoria Cougars by capturing silver with Canada at the 1975 world juniors. Former Victoria Cougars Curt Fraser and the late Gary Lupul followed up in Canada kit with silver medals in 1978 and 1979, respectively.
The clever and flash-quick small-forward Mark Morrison of the Victoria Cougars, later coach in pro hockey with the Victoria Salmon Kings, and the late Paul Cyr of Port Alberni were gold medallists in 1982 at Rochester, Minnesota. That was the year the tape machine in the cold and drafty little rink jammed after the ceremony, leaving the Canadian players to fill the awkward silence by launching into an impromptu and passionate version of O Canada. Morrison and Cyr were back a year later as part of the 1983 bronze-medallist Canadian team captained by Morrison in Leningrad.
Former NHLer Kent Manderville of Victoria, who would go on to win a silver medal for Canada at the 1992 Albertville Winter Olympics, won back-to-back world junior gold medals in 1990 and 1991. Retired NHL veterans Russ Courtnall of Victoria and Rod Brind’Amour of Campbell River also played in the world juniors at 1984 in Sweden and 1989 in Anchorage, respectively. Both went on to respective fourth-place Winter Olympics placings at Sarajevo in 1984 and Nagano in 1998.
Former NHL forward Matt Pettinger, now playing in Germany with the Hamburg Freezers, won bronze with Canada at the 2000 world junior championships in Sweden.
