The drama of the Stanley Cup will begin this weekend, when the Edmonton Oilers and Florida Panthers begin their battle for the best trophy in sports.
Three months from now, the Oilers will be sending their top prospects to the Okanagan, as the Vancouver Canucks announced Thursday, when they’ll be hosting their annual Young Stars tournament in Penticton.
The four-day event will run Sept. 13-16 at the South Okanagan Events Centre.
Like prior years, the Canucks, Oilers, Calgary Flames and Winnipeg Jets will each bring their top prospects to the rookie tournament.
“We are excited to be heading back to Penticton this fall to participate in this great event,” said Canucks GM Patrik Allvin.
“This will be an opportunity for some of our top prospects to work with Manny Malhotra in a very competitive environment. We look forward to seeing Jonathan Lekkerimäki, Elias Pettersson, Ty Mueller and Ty Young compete in this tournament.”
If you’re thinking Canucks captain Elias Pettersson will be at this year’s event, that won’t be the case.
Rather, it’s a 20-year-old defenceman, also from Sweden, with the exact same spelling.
The younger Pettersson, who is listed at 6-2 and 194 pounds, was selected in the third round, 80th overall in the 2022 NHL draft.
He also played for Sweden twice at the World Junior Championship.
Name confusion aside, this will be the 11th year Penticton will host the tournament, which features six round-robin games.
According to the Canucks, a handful of players who participated in last year’s event went on to make the NHL, including Vancouver’s Arshdeep Bains and Cole McWard, Calgary’s Matt Coronato, Adam Klapka and Yan Kuznetsov plus Winnipeg’s Nikita Chibrikov and Brad Lambert.
Information about tickets and game times will be announced at a later date.