Two local players will be skating for the Kelowna Rockets at the Mastercard Memorial Cup tournament in Quebec City.
Riley Stadel of Cloverdale and South Surrey’s Devante Stephens, both defencemen, will be playing for the Western Hockey League champions at the four-team national championship tournament which gets underway today (Friday).
The Rockets swept the Brandon Wheat Kings 4-0 in the best-of-seven WHL final to win the Ed Chynoweth Cup, and will compete against the Ontario Hockey League champion Oshawa Generals, Quebec Major Junior Hockey League champion Rimouski Oceanic, and the host Quebec Remparts.
Kelowna will play Quebec tonight at 4:30 pm (PDT). All games will be televised by Sportsnet.
The Rockets clinched the WHL championship with a 3-0 victory over Brandon Wednesday, May 13 in Kelowna. Wednesday’s win completed Stadel’s third, and most productive, season with the Rockets. He played in 71 games, scored 10 goals and added 33 assists for 43 points. He was a plus-36 and had 77 penalty minutes. All numbers were career bests.
After completing the 2010-11 season with the Cloverdale Colts Bantam A team, Stadel playing one season of Midget hockey in nearby Penticton with the Okanagan Hockey Academy. He played two games with the Rockets as a 15-year-old, then cracked the lineup a year later, playing in 49 games in 2012-13.
Stephens played his first year as a Midget with the Valley West Hawks of the BC Hockey Major Midget League, netting six goals and 20 points in 22 games played in the 2013-14 season.
This past season, he suited up for 64 games with the Rockets, scoring four goals and adding seven assists. He’s added four assists in the postseason, playing in 17 of Kelowna’s 19 playoff games.