With no local hockey taking place at all in 2021 so far in the region, Ben Gaudreau's journey to Under-18 gold was under the spotlight last week.
Gaudreau, led Team Canada's Under-18 team to a championship last week during the IIHF World Under-18 Hockey Championship in Texas last Friday.
It was an amazing accomplishment for Gaudreau, who had not played a real game in over a year before running off five straight wins and getting named the tournament's top goaltender.
But he's not alone in World Hockey Championship success with Team Canada, as a number of other North Bay area players and coaches have tasted international gold.
See related: Gaudreau feels some Golden Deja-vu
Colton Point, the last local player to be taken in the NHL Entry Draft back in 2016 by the Dallas Stars, won gold with Team Canada at the World Junior Hockey Championship in Buffalo New York back in 2018.
Point helped out Canada with a shutout performance against Slovakia while watching current Philadelphia Flyers goalie Carter Hart who got the workload for Canada including a victory in the Gold Medal game over Team Sweden.
Point is currently finishing the final year of his entry-level contract with the Dallas Stars AHL affiliate in Texas.
See related: Golden Point!
In 2016, Nick Paul, not a local player but a star on the North Bay Battalion captured gold with Team Canada that year. Paul is currently a top-nine forward on the Ottawa Senators.
In the spring of 2016, Mike Yeo had a unique World Hockey Championship experience with Team Canada.
A few months after being fired by the Minnesota Wild, Team Canada came calling and offered Yeo - now an assistant coach with the Philadelphia Flyers - a spot as an assistant coach with the National Team for the Men's World Hockey Championships.
Team Canada, led by a guy named Connor McDavid, defeated Finland 2-0 in the Gold Medal game in late May of 2016.
See related: Golden moment for North Bay's Mike Yeo and Team Canada
Prior to that win, you have to go way back to the spring of 2003 when Montreal Canadiens defenceman Craig Rivet answered the call for Team Canada at the event that took place in Finland.
He was part of a Canadian team that defeated Sweden in overtime on a long video review goal scored by Anson Carter which kept Rivet and Canadian fans on the edge of their seat while officials went over the video.
That was the first gold for the Men's Canadian Team at the World's since 1997.
It was some golden deja-vu for Rivet, as back in 1989, Rivet captured gold with the Hal's Marine Bantams at an international tournament in Finland.
