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Schneider Joins Long List of Team Canada Wheat Kings

December 24, 2020 - Western Hockey League (WHL)
Brandon Wheat Kings News Release


Edmonton, AB. - When Team Canada takes to the ice in Edmonton this Saturday to begin defence of their World Junior Hockey championship, Brandon defenceman Braden Schneider will be joining some pretty select company in Wheat Kings' franchise history.

A 19-year old Prince Albert, Saskatchewan product, Schneider will become the 18th Wheat King to represent Canada at the World Juniors. He also becomes the first since Kale Clague helped the National Team capture the gold medal in 2018.

For Schneider, a 6'2″ 109 lb. New York Rangers' first round draft choice, having a chance to play for Team Canada is especially sweet, after being one of the team's final cuts last year.

"I learned a lot more about what it takes," Schneider recently told TSN's Mark Masters. "I'd never really been cut from a team so you learn a lot more from your failures. For me, personally, I knew I had a lot more work to do and a lot more growth as a player and a person and I took full advantage of that."

While Schneider was excited to make the club, his parents in Prince Albert were ecstatic. In fact, after notifying his parents that he'd made the final roster, his father changed the Christmas lights at their home from white to red and white.

"After what happened last year and then seeing the disappointment, but also the amount of growth I made, I know they wish they could be here (in Edmonton) to support me," says Schneider, who scored seven goals and 42 points for Brandon during the 2019-20 season. "They're showing everything they can to show they're still here."

This year's tournament won't be his first taste of international hockey. In addition to representing Brandon on Team WHL during last November's Canada-Russia CHL Series, he played for Team Canada at the 2018 U18 World Championships, where he scored a goal and three points in 7 games.

Schneider and Clague are two of sixteen Wheat Kings that have played for Team Canada. Seven of them went on to win gold medals, including goalkeeper Trevor Kidd, defenceman Wade Redden and center Marty Murray, who all won two each.

Other Wheat King gold medal winners are Keith Aulie, Darcy Werenka and Peter Schaefer.

One Brandon star who didn't capture gold but enjoyed a stellar 2-year run with Team Canada was center Brayden Schenn of the National Hockey League's St. Louis Blues. A former Wheat King captain, Schenn recorded ten goals and 26 points while attending back to back World Junior Championships (2010 and 2011) to lead all Brandon players in all time tournament scoring. Murray, who currently serves as general manager and head coach of the USHL's Sioux Falls Stampede, is next with 19 points, including seven goals, followed by Mark Stone of the Vegas Golden Knights and Finland's Toni Rajala with ten points each.

Rounding out the long list of Wheat Kings that have played for Canada at the annual tournament are John Quenneville, Jordin Tootoo, Derek Laxdal, Ray Allison, Brad McCrimmon, Brian Propp, Dale McMullin and Rick Blight.

Meanwhile nine western Manitobans have skated for Team Canada, including Brandon's Calen Addison of the Lethbridge Hurricanes last year. Others include Travis Sanheim (Elkhorn), Chris Nielsen (Goodlands), Pat Falloon (Foxwarren), Sheldon Kennedy (Elkhorn), Dean Evason (Brandon), Kimbi Daniels (Brandon) and Ken Wregget (Brandon).

As for the tournament, which opens up with three games on Christmas Day followed by three more on Boxing Day, the prestigious holiday season event had no choice but to share the spotlight with the COVID-10 virus this year. While the International Ice Hockey Federation said earlier this week that there were no new reported cases involving players, the majority of the German team had been quarantined for most of the week because eight players tested positive when the arrived last weekend.

Needless to say, Schneider and the Canadians, who were forced to quarantine at this year's Selection Camp in Red Deer, are not the only country in the ten team tournament that has had its preparation disrupted during the days and weeks leading up to the event.

Going back even further, twenty of Canada's 25-man roster haven't played a real game in months as both the Western and Ontario Hockey Leagues have seen delays to open up their respective 2020-21 campaigns. Schneider hadn't played a real game since March 7th, before Canada's one and only pre-tournament tune up game Wednesday night against Russia.

"Our practices have been great, but nothing can replace a game," says Canadian assistant coach and former Brandon defenceman Michael Dyck. "There's situations in a game that you're only going to see in games and not in practices. We try to simulate as much aa we can but we certainly miss playing games."

"I really like the way we've handled it so far," says Dyck, who currently serves as head coach of the WHL's Vancouver Giants. "Even without playing a game, we're going to get stronger and we're going to get tighter as a group. I really like the way the guys have handled the instability up to this point.

There are six returning players that won gold last January, including Vancouvers's Bowen Byram and Dylan Cozens of Lethbridge. The others are Quinton Byfield of the Sudbury Wolves, Jamie Drysdale of Erie, London's Connor McMichael and Dawson Mercer of Chicoutimi of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.

Canada, who opens up the tournament against Germany, has won eighteen gold medals at the IIHF World Junior Championships, eleven silver and six bronze.

All games will be televised coast to coast on both TSN and RDS, the official broadcast partners of Hockey Canada.

For more information from the IIHF, visit the official tournament website at www.iihf.com.

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