How the new CHL USA Prospects Challenge came together

The inaugural CHL USA Prospects Challenge is set to commence next week in London and Oshawa, showcasing the best talent the CHL and the USA Hockey National Team Development Program has to offer.

It’s a highly anticipated showcase, and it will mark the first CHL-hosted international event since the CHL-Russia series that ran from 2003 until 2019.

In the first episode of On The Sheet with Jeff Marek, CHL president Dan MacKenzie discussed the reasons for starting the event, and how it all came together:

Jeff Marek: “For the longest time, it’s been said that the future of international hockey is Canada vs. the United States. And we’ve been saying that for 20, 25 years, and here we are. What was the genesis of this one? This is the old top prospects game, but now there’s an added intrigue or an added sort of layer of rivalry between Canada and the USA. And then again, on top of all of this is the NCAA ruling about CHL players. Like in a lot of ways, like this Rubik’s cube is sort of all coming together at the right time for it.”

Dan MacKenzie: “Once we got through COVID and some of the craziness that was marked by the beginning of my first few years, we started to look at our national events. The Canada-Russia series got parked for obvious reasons. And so we started to think about, ‘OK, what does our national event portfolio look like going forward?’ I’d say there’s two pieces to it. I think we think the Memorial Cup, as I said earlier, is the right event to be doing the way it’s operated for now. There’s a (top) prospects game, and then we used to have Canada-Russia. So we’re still down an event. We’d like to have a third national event at some point. We’re still working on that. So we don’t have anything to report there… I’d love to be able to break some news, but we don’t have any yet, but we’re working on it.

“But on the prospects game, one of the realities of that age group, and you would know better than most, is the best draft eligible prospects from the CHL and the US never traditionally have played each other. So, at the world championships, Canada sends, doesn’t send its best team because we still have players who are playing in the playoffs in the CHL. And then the US sends their best. But in the summer, for Hlinka Gretzky, that group is turned over. And they’re on to the next group. So it was never the best on best playing each other.

“And so our thought was… what if we modified the prospects game in such a way that we had the best players in the US playing the best players in the CHL? And so we approached USA Hockey about it. And they had an interest in exploring something. So we did a 3+1 year deal. We’re going to rotate the games amongst the three Canadian leagues. It’s OHL this year, (WHL) next year, and then the (QMJHL) after that. And then, the US will have an opportunity to host if they choose in Year 4. And we’ll see how it goes.

“But we think it’s from the perspective of talent on the ice, we think that the skill level is going to be off the charts. I mean, if you look at the draft projections, more than half of the first round is going to be on that ice when these two teams play each other. You know, the (Michael) Misa’s and the (Porter) Martone’s and the (Matthew Schaefer’s). There’s going to be some really good players on the ice. From a fan’s perspective, we think seeing these best players compete is going to be great.

“But I think the added element that’s really neat is there is going to be unlike, I don’t want to say unlike an all-star game or a prospects game, because those are important nights for those players. But (it will have) a bit of a different edge to the game. And we’ve heard how important, hearing from players on both teams, that there’s going to be something on the line here. Players care about the systems they come through and where they’re from. And so I think you’re going to see a bit of that Canada-US edge to it.”

You can listen to the full episode below: