Ottawa has a long and proud sport tradition, and in this ongoing series, we will present highlight moments and figures from our local sport history. The Ottawa Sport History Highlight series is presented by the Ottawa Sport Hall of Fame, which has welcomed almost 300 inductees dating back to its establishment in 1968. Find out more at OttawaSportHall.ca.
This edition looks back at the first Bell Canada Ottawa International Hockey Festival (now called the Bell Capital Cup) and the traditions it’s built on the road to its recent 25th tournament.
The latest set of players and families from Ottawa and around the world got to soak in the special traditions that have become synonymous with the Bell Capital Cup during the recent milestone 25th edition of the holiday season tournament.
Initially modelled after the renowned peewee hockey tournament in Quebec City, the very first Bell Canada Ottawa International Hockey Festival took place from Jan. 6-9, 2000 and featured only the atom age division.
“The NHL guys (including the Ottawa Senators’ Marian Hossa) remember when they were peewees and went to Quebec,” co-chair Cyril Leeder explained to the Ottawa Citizen‘s Rick Mayoh. “We’re hoping for the same experience. We hope kids will say, ‘One of my fondest hockey memories was when I went to Ottawa, skated on the Rideau Canal and got to play in a big Ottawa tournament.'”
Sure enough, there are a long list of current NHLers who played in the Bell Capital Cup during their minor hockey careers, including Connor McDavid, P.K. Subban, Mitch Marner and the Senators’ Shane Pinto.
While coaching the Kanata Blazers at the halfway point to the 25th anniversary back in 2012, former NHLer Mike Eastwood confirmed to the Ottawa Sports Pages’ Dan Plouffe that the Ottawa tournament had indeed already achieved those objectives.
“A lot of guys who are now playing in the National Hockey League have fond memories of it,” said the 17-year-old NHL veteran who coached his son’s team to the final of the Minor Atom ‘AAA’ competition.
“Now for these kids, they know all that and they grew up in Kanata with this tournament right before their eyes every Christmas and now they get a chance to play in it,” he added. “To make it to the finals is something they’re going to take with them and remember for the rest of their lives.”
There were 94 boys and girls atom teams in the first Ottawa International Hockey Festival, primarily from Ontario and Quebec, plus one from New York state to allow the event to officially fulfill the “international” component.
That was lower than the 150 teams organizers initially envisioned, with 50 relegated to a waitlist due to insufficient available ice time (prior to the construction of the tournament’s current main facilities at the Bell and Richcraft Sensplexes).
But the 1,600 players spread across nine divisions, backed by 300 volunteers, nevertheless pulled off a successful inaugural event.
“The community really pulled together. But we expected that. Ottawa is a tremendous hockey city,” Ottawa-Carleton regional chair Bob Chiarelli told Mayoh.
“We want to work towards creating the largest international hockey tournament in the world in Ottawa,” he’d said at the outset.
Eventually, Cup leaders got their wish. The event remains the Guinness World Record holder as the largest hockey tournament ever held when the 2006-2007 event drew 510 teams with 8,145 players to the nation’s capital, generating $13 million in economic activity within the region.
“It is one of the premier hockey tournaments in the world today, which is something that the residents of the National Capital Region should be extremely proud of,” Leeder said at the time.
Among the Cup’s celebrated traditions built from the earliest editions were division championship games between played on the Senators’ home ice at the Corel Centre (now Canadian Tire Centre), players trading pins with foreign friends, and local families billeting teams from overseas.
“They’ve had a blast,” reported parent Donnie Carle, whose Nepean Raiders Minor Peewee ‘AA’ team wound up playing the Jokerit team they were hosting in the 2012 tournament final. “The first day when they slept over, our two billets had their own room, and the next day, they were all sleeping in the same room. They’re all saying that they’re best friends.
“Just to get to the finals is a huge experience in itself and then to play our billets, who coulda wrote it any better? It’s a storybook end.”
Katelyn Dagg was among the hometown heroes in the first tournament as she returned from a broken arm earlier in the season in time to provide an offensive spark for her Nepean Demons in their run to the girls’ A championship game, although the Cornwall Typhoons ultimately won that division.
Other local teams crowned champs in year one were the Cumberland Barons (Major Atom AA), Nepean Raiders (Minor A), Smiths Falls Bears (Major B) and Voiliers d’Aylmer (House A).
The tournament expanded to include peewee divisions early on during its run, which was interrupted for two years during the COVID pandemic.
The 25th edition featured 17 categories for different ages and abilities, with girls’ divisions deleted and a para hockey division added.
More than 280 teams from Canada, the United States, Hong Kong, Austria, Japan, South Korea and Kazakhstan attended the most recent tournament.
The U13 AA final was an all-international affair as GIHA Korea Blue scored a late goal to top Austria’s Carinthian Eagles, while seven local teams emerged as tournament champions, reported Martin Cleary in the Ottawa Sports Pages.
Learn more about our local sport heritage on the Ottawa Sport Hall of Fame’s website at OttawaSportHall.ca.