Connolly Will Wear Maple Leaf Again

News 2008-09

Connolly Will Wear Maple Leaf Again

For the second time this season, Prince George Cougars forward Brett Connolly will wear the Maple Leaf at an international hockey tournament, this time at the World Under-18 championship.

Hockey Canada and the Canadian Hockey League (CHL) announced on Thursday the 22 players that will make up Canada’s National Men’s Under-18 Team at the 2009 IIHF World Under-18 Championship set for April 9-19 in Fargo, North Dakota and Moorhead, Minnesota.

The roster is comprised of players born in 1991 or earlier whose teams are no longer competing in the CHL playoffs with their respective club teams. Many of Canada’s players named today will be among the top selections at the 2009 NHL Entry Draft in Montreal, Que. in June.  Connolly, who turns 17 in a month, is one of three players on the Canadian roster born in 1992, joining defenceman Erik Gudbranson of the Ontario Hockey League’s Kingston Frontenacs and forward John McFarland of the OHL’s Sudbury Wolves.

In January, Connolly earned a silver medal at the World U-17 challenge in Port Alberni, where he led Team Pacific with eight points in six games.  Canada’s roster includes 12 players from the Ontario Hockey League, eight (8) players from the Western Hockey League and one (1) player from the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, as well as one from the Alberta Junior Hockey League.