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Maybe it’s not true now and we need to find a better researcher, but at one time the Regina Pats had proudly supplied more players to the world junior championships than any other hockey team.
From Bedard to Eberle to Derkatch, the WHL’s Regina Pats have had players on Team Canada’s roster 34 times.
Maybe it’s not true now and we need to find a better researcher, but at one time the Regina Pats had proudly supplied more players to the world junior championships than any other hockey team.
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Included among the Pats who have filled 34 red-and-white (sometimes black) Team Canada jerseys during the event’s 49-year history are multi-timers Connor Bedard, Jordan Eberle, Colten Teubert, Barret Jackman, Jeff Friesen, Gary Leeman and Dale Derkatch, according to theblueliner.com. We can’t really include former Pats captain Tanner Howe, who was traded away from Regina last month and is on the 2-0-1 Canadian team currently vying for a gold medal — and drawing lots of adverse attention — at this year’s event in Ottawa.
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“He’s always gonna be a Pat,” said Regina forward Tye Spencer. “It shows the kind of players we build here.
“I look at Howie as a great example, someone who started here when he was 16. He had it kind of tough with the (COVID-19 shortened schedule as a rookie), but throughout the years with all the work he’s put in, I hope nothing but the best for him.”
Another 12 world junior roster spots have been filled by Pats on European teams, including current goalie Ewan Huet, who is playing for Switzerland.
“I’m proud to say, ‘Oh my God, those are my friends, my teammates,’ ” said veteran Pats forward Braxton Whitehead.
“I wish, you know, it could have been me. But I’m proud regardless that they’re out there tearing it up.”
As the only American on the Pats’ roster — although he said new teammate Ephram McNutt claims dual citizenship — Whitehead has been dealing with some patriotic rivalries. Whitehead specifically reminded his Canadian teammates that his home country, the defending champion, defeated Latvia 5-1 one day after the Latvians celebrated an unprecedented 3-2 shootout victory over Canada on Friday night. That loss drew the ire of couch coaches across Canada, who have been critical of the team’s selection process.
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“I wouldn’t mind seeing Canada slip into second place behind us,” Whitehead said with a chuckle. “But even if they do win, I would still be super proud.”
The Pats couldn’t watch that controversial Latvian game because they were winning their own WHL contest, beating the host Brandon Wheat Kings 7-3 on Friday. Nor will the Pats be able to watch the traditional U.S./Canada matchup on New Year’s Eve because they’re opening a home-and-home set with the Moose Jaw Warriors. Tuesday’s game is 6 p.m. at the Moose Jaw Events Centre. Faceoff for the rematch is 4 p.m. Wednesday at the Brandt Centre.
The Warriors (8-21-4) sit 11th in the Eastern Conference and the Pats are 10th, falling to 9-18-6 after losing 5-2 to the visiting Saskatoon Blades on Saturday.
Instead of traditional red-white-and-blue, the Pats on Saturday wore jerseys paying homage to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The tribute jerseys were replete with green numbers, turtle-shell patterns, a silhouette of Regina’s skyline and cartoon caricatures of the pizza-eating, crime-fighting crew.
Whitehead gave the jerseys a thumbs-up and noted there was enough blue in the design to co-ordinate with his team’s navy pants.
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“Those jerseys were sick,” said Spencer after the sweaters were auctioned postgame as a fundraiser. “They’ve got some cool, cool stuff on them. It’s pretty unique what they do with those things.”
Spencer “watched them a bit (growing up), but I’m not a huge Ninja Turtle guy,” he said before promptly and impressively reeling off the names and corresponding colours of the four Turtles — Raphael (red), Leonardo (blue), Donatello (purple) and Michelangelo (orange).
Listing all 46 Pats and the years they played in the world juniors is more difficult, even for head coach Brad Herauf, a local product who wasn’t born when Jim Minor and Ed Staniowski made the 1975 Canadian squad as holdovers from Regina’s last Memorial Cup-winning roster in 1974.
“There was Brad Stuart and Jeff Friesen, and Barret Jackman played a couple years there, Josh Harding,” said Herauf, listing some Team Canada Pats from the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s. “Now the names are coming back. Guys from my age group.
“Lots of guys have represented this organization.”
A Pats assistant for eight seasons before being promoted to head coach in 2023, Herauf also recalled a gold-medal meeting two years ago between Bedard, whose team won, and Czechia defender Stanislav Svozil. They’re the only Pats who represented their respective countries three times at the world juniors, but — Cowabunga, Dude! — they missed the Turtles gear.
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