Prince George, B.C. – On Monday,  the puck will drop  to  open the  Telus Cup  in Prince George,  the tournament that  determines the National Midget Hockey champions. 

“We’ve been working on  bringing  the Telus Cup  to Prince George for  two years” says Telus Cup Committee Co-Chair, Shawn Rice.   He says the work over those two years  has  involved  many members of the community ” A lot of volunteer work  a lot of community support both  from our sponsorship side, we’ve got tremendous support from the  community on sponsorship.  This event will cost us about half a million dollars and between  our in kind donations, and   cash donations, we will create a really  nice legacy for this community and the kids in this community.”

The  Midget hockey season in Canada  started with 150 teams,  and  now,  the best of the best   will  see six teams  battle it out over the next week   with a dream  to be Telus Cup Champions.

Yes, the host team is allowed to take  part in the  tourney, but the Cariboo Cougars  did not  take the easy way into this  championship.   The Cariboo Cougars,  are coming off  a record breaking season, they are  the BC  Champions  and  heading into this  tournament  as serious contenders.  They play their first game Monday  evening at 7:30  against the Leduc  Oil Kings.

“People can expect to see some incredible hockey” says Rice “We’ve got the best of the best  15 to 17 year olds  coming from across Canada.  Maybe we’ll see another Sid Crosby,  Patrick  Roy, Wendell Clark, players like that   who played in the  Telus Cup in the past, Joe Sakic from B.C. played in this event.  We could be  seeing some  future Hall of Fame NHLers play here in Prince George.”

This is the second time Prince George has  hosted the  championship.   The  city hosted  what was then called the Air Canada Cup in 2001.  “We are one of a handful,  maybe four or five communities across Canada  that have hosted this event for the second time.  It shows what Hockey Canada thinks of Prince George.  They came here and saw what we had done with the Canada Winter Games it just highlighted what  Prince George can do and what our  abilities are when it comes to volunteers,  when it comes to community support.  They were excited to award it to us for the second time.”

The event  will give the City  an economic boost says rice   “It means a lot to Prince George,  an event like this usually carries about   $2 million dollars in  economic benefit to the  community.  Also, Prince George is  a hockey community and anytime you have a major event like this, it just showcases  how much Prince George and the community comes together for an event like hockey  and we always talk  about ourselves as being the volunteer capital of B.C. and this event shows  it again. We’ve got   volunteers coming out who have just finished volunteering for the  Prince George Cougars, the Cariboo Cougars and the Spruce Kings  and they are all coming together to make this the best event ever.”

All games  are being played at the CN Centre. There are still tickets available.   Tournament passes are  available  for $79 dollars and are  available at the CN Centre  box office.  Tickets  are also available for individual games.

The full schedule  for the tournament  can be accessed here.