OHL Alumni Central

Thinking the title is a typo and that it should say seven players? Different Team Canada. Six Ontario Hockey League grads will be on the roster of Team Canada for the upcoming Spengler Cup in Davos, Switzerland. You can actually make that seven if you include assistant coach, Doug Shedden.

For those who don’t know, the Spengler is an inviational tournament held between Christmas and New Year’s every year in Davos, Switzerland. Team Canada and HC Davos are perennial participants while the other teams are selected each year from Europe’s elite leagues. This season, Genève-Servette (Swiss National League A), Spartak Moskva (Russia’s KHL), SKA St. Petersburg (Russia’s KHL) and HC Sparta Praha (Czech Republic’s Extraliga) round out the headliners.

The six OHL grads are as follows (click on each name to view a previous post at OHL Alumni Central featuring that player):

Tyler Moss – Tyler played for the Kingston Frontenacs for three years from 1992-93 to 1994-95. He is now the goaltender for the SCL Lions in Switzerland’s National League A.

Mark Popovic – Mark played four seasons with the Toronto St. Michael’s Majors from 1998-99 to 2001-02. He is currently playing for HC Lugano in the National League A.

Brendan Bell – Brendan played with the Ottawa 67′s for four seasons from 1999-00 to 2002-03. Mark is currently a member of HC Biel in the NLA.

Brendan Brooks – Brendan played just one season in the Ontario Hockey League, 1997-98. His season in the OHL was split between the Owen Sound Platers and the North Bay Centennials. Brendan joins Tyler Moss on the SCL Tigers.

Mark Bell – Mark played four seasons with the Ottawa 67′s from 1996-97 to 1999-00. Mark is a member of the Kloten Flyers in the NLA.

Blaine Down – Blane played for the Barrie Colts for three seasons from 1999-00 to 2001-02. He is currently playing for ZSC Lions from Zurich in the NLA.

Tomorrow, we’ll feature the OHL Alumni on the other five teams in the tournament.

Mark Bell with the Kloten Flyers.

Mark Bell played four seasons in the Ontario Hockey League from 1996-97 to 1999-00, all with the

Kloten Flyers logo.

 Ottawa 67′s. In his first season, he played on a 67′s team that had high expectations of a Memorial Cup appearance but was shot down in the Ontario Hockey League’s Robertson Cup finals. In his third season, the 67′s won the Memorial Cup that they hosted despite not even appearing in the Robertson Cup final. Bell was second in scoring during that tournament.

In his final three seasons of OHL hockey, Mark was well above a point per game player. In his final season, he scored 34 goals and added 38 assists for 72 points in only 48 games.

Bell was drafted in the first round of the 1998 NHL draft by the Chicago Blackhawks, eighth overall. He played only 13 games in his first season out of junior, spending most of that season with the Norfolk Admirals of the AHL. In 2001-02, Mark became a regular with Chicago and missed only two regular season games over four seasons with the Blackhawks (not including 2004-05 – the dreaded strike year).

Mark shifted to the San Jose Sharks for the 2006-07 season then was cursed when he was sent to the Toronto Maple Leafs for 2007-08. Bell played only 35 games with the Leafs. he split 2008-09 with the Toronto Marlies and Hartford Wolf Pack of the AHL before heading to Europe.

The Kloten Flyers finished fifth in the twelve team Swiss National League A. Bell played 39 of the team’s 50 regular season games and added 27 points. Kloten is to Zurich what Mississauga is to Toronto. Like Mississauga, the Zurich airport is actually located in Kloten.

Check out Mark Bell’s profile page on the Kloten Flyers official website.

Mark Bell is mentioned in this previous post about the Ottawa 67′s appearance at the 1999 Memorial Cup.