The Vancouver Blazers were a professional ice hockey team that played in the World Hockey Association from 1973 to 1975. The Blazers played at the Pacific Coliseum in Vancouver, sharing the facility with the Vancouver Canucks of the National Hockey League. The Blazers were owned by local businessman Jim Pattison. The franchise moved to Vancouver after a single season in Philadelphia. Unable to establish a strong fan base in Vancouver, the team was moved again in 1975 to become the Calgary Cowboys.
Jim Robson OBC is a former radio and television broadcaster who was the play-by-play announcer of the Vancouver Canucks' games from 1970 to 1999.
The Calgary Canucks are a junior A ice hockey team in the Alberta Junior Hockey League (AJHL). They play in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, with home games at the Ken Bracko Arena. They have won the AJHL championship nine times and one national championship.
The NHL's Smythe Division was formed in 1974 as part of the Clarence Campbell Conference. The division existed for 19 seasons until 1993. It was named in honour of Conn Smythe, who was a longtime owner, general manager, and head coach in the league. It is the forerunner of the NHL's Northwest Division and Pacific Division.
The National Hockey League's Pacific Division was formed in 1993 as part of the Western Conference in a league realignment. It is also one of the two successors of the Smythe Division, though of the current teams, only the Anaheim Ducks, Seattle Kraken and Vegas Golden Knights did not play in the Smythe Division. Due to subsequent realignments, three of the Pacific Division's original teams left the division in 1998 but returned in 2013. The division is the only one in the NHL without any Original Six teams. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting closure of the Canada-United States border, all eight teams were transferred into two different divisions for the 2020–21 NHL season. The American-based teams were moved to the West Division, while the Canadian-based teams were placed into the North Division.
The NHL's Northwest Division was formed in 1998 as part of the Western Conference due to expansion. The teams in the Pacific Division were split up, with the Calgary Flames, Colorado Avalanche, Edmonton Oilers, and the Vancouver Canucks becoming the newly formed Northwest Division. The Minnesota Wild joined the division in 2000 as an expansion team. Like the Pacific Division, the Northwest Division is also a descendant of the former Smythe Division, as three of its Canadian teams played in that division from 1981 to 1993.
The history of ice hockey in Calgary extends back well over a century to the first recorded ice hockey game in Alberta in 1893. Imported from eastern Canada, the game's popularity rapidly grew in the city, with teams at every level playing for and capturing Canada's national championships. Calgary is known today as one of Canada's best ice hockey cities with the Calgary Flames and Calgary Hitmen receiving immense support from the city. The Calgary Oval X-Treme is one of the most dominant women's ice hockey teams in the country, while Junior A ice hockey is also well supported with two teams in the city. Calgary is home to the Mac's AAA midget hockey tournament, one of the most prestigious midget hockey tournaments in the world which has seen dozens of future National Hockey League players play in this city before their professional careers began.
The Red Deer Rustlers were a Junior A ice hockey team in the Alberta Junior Hockey League based in Red Deer, Alberta. They captured the inaugural Centennial Trophy in 1971. Their eight AJHL championships remains the second most in league history, behind the Calgary Canucks nine championships.
Mason Evan Raymond is a Canadian former professional ice hockey winger who played in the National Hockey League (NHL) with the Vancouver Canucks, Toronto Maple Leafs, Calgary Flames and the Anaheim Ducks. He represented Canada in South Korea for the 2018 Winter Olympics.
The 2007–08 Vancouver Canucks season was the Canucks' 38th season in the National Hockey League. After having reached the Western Conference Semi-Finals the previous year, Vancouver would fail to reach the playoffs.
The 1997–98 Vancouver Canucks season was the team's 28th season in the National Hockey League (NHL). After missing the playoffs the season before, the team responded by signing Mark Messier to a three-year contract. The signing of Messier did little to improve the team, however, as they finished even worse than the year before, costing Head Coach Tom Renney and General Manager Pat Quinn their jobs. For the first time in NHL history, regular season games were played outside of North America, with the Canucks playing the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim in Tokyo, Japan, to open up the regular season. Pavel Bure became the last Canuck to score 50 or more goals in a season. On April 9, 1998, the Canucks scored three short-handed goals in a 6–3 road win over the Calgary Flames.
The 1988–89 Vancouver Canucks season saw the Canucks finish in fourth place in the Smythe Division with a record of 33 wins, 39 losses, and 8 ties for 74 points. They met the first-place Calgary Flames in the Division Semi-finals and extended the series to a decisive seventh game. However, the Flames took the game and the series on a Joel Otto goal in overtime en route to a Stanley Cup championship.
The Abbotsford Heat were a professional ice hockey team that played five seasons in the American Hockey League (AHL) between 2009 and 2014. The team was based in Abbotsford, British Columbia, Canada, and played its home games at the 7,046-seat Abbotsford Entertainment & Sports Centre. The franchise was the National Hockey League (NHL) affiliate of the Calgary Flames and arrived in Abbotsford in 2009 as a relocated franchise formerly known as the Quad City Flames. The team played five seasons in British Columbia before the Flames' lease agreement with the City of Abbotsford was terminated following the 2013–14 season.
The Alberta Junior Hockey League (AJHL) is an Alberta-based Junior A ice hockey league that belongs to the Canadian Junior Hockey League (CJHL). It was formed as a five-team league in 1964. There are currently 16 teams in the league. The regular season league champions receive the Dave Duchak Trophy. The playoff champions receive the Inter Pipeline Cup. The winner of the AJHL playoffs continues on to play in the Doyle Cup series, which determines the Pacific region berth in the national Junior A championship, the Centennial Cup.
The Alberta Rugby Football Union was formed on September 25, 1911, and governed the newly emerging and evolving sport of football in the province for over 2 decades before it was disbanded in 1936. First the Calgary Rugby Football Union (CRFU) was created on September 29, 1908. The CRFU would play the champion from Edmonton to determine the winner of the Alberta Rugby Football League for 4 seasons from 1907 to 1910. After that the Alberta Rugby Football Union was formed in 1911. It joined the Manitoba Rugby Football Union and the Saskatchewan Rugby Football Union to form the Western Canada Rugby Football Union (WCRFU) in 1911.
Sven Bärtschi is a Swiss professional ice hockey forward currently playing for SC Bern in the National League (NL). He played his first professional games in 2009 for SC Langenthal in the National League B before moving to North America to join Portland in the Western Hockey League (WHL), where he finished as the runner-up for the league's Rookie of the Year award. He was selected by the Calgary Flames in the first round, 13th overall, at the 2011 NHL Entry Draft and made his NHL debut in 2012.
The Canucks–Flames rivalry is a rivalry that takes place in the Pacific Division of the National Hockey League between the Vancouver Canucks and the Calgary Flames. The Vancouver Canucks started play in the 1970–71 season as an expansion team and the Calgary Flames started play during the 1980–81 season as a relocated team from Atlanta. This rivalry is notable in that both teams have played each other in three overtime game sevens in the playoffs, second only in the NHL to the St. Louis Blues and Minnesota North Stars/Dallas Stars.
The 2020–21 Vancouver Canucks season was the 51st season for the National Hockey League franchise that was established on May 22, 1970.
The 2020–21 Calgary Flames season was the Flames' 41st season in Calgary, and the 49th season for the Flames' National Hockey League franchise that was established on June 6, 1972. The Flames attempted unsuccessfully to make the playoffs for a third straight year after getting eliminated in the First Round of the 2020 Stanley Cup playoffs by the Dallas Stars.
The Abbotsford Canucks are a Canadian professional ice hockey team based in Abbotsford, British Columbia, and members of the American Hockey League (AHL). The team began play in the 2021–22 season with home games at Abbotsford Centre as the AHL affiliate of the National Hockey League's Vancouver Canucks. The team is a relocation of the franchise owned by the Canucks and known as the Utica Comets from 2013 to 2021. This is the second AHL team to play in Abbotsford after the Calgary Flames affiliate Abbotsford Heat from 2009 until 2014.
