It was a golden summer for Peyton Krebs, who captured a championship title with Canada’s U18 squad at the Hlinka Gretzky Cup in August.
And he got to do it in his backyard in Alberta.
The Kootenay Ice forward tallied five points in as many games as Canada romped through preliminary and elimination rounds to dump Sweden 6-2 in the final for a gold medal on home soil.
“It was a special experience, for sure,” said Krebs. “I think anytime you can throw on that jersey, it’s amazing. I say it over and over again — going around warm-ups, you get a little chuckle on your face, its pretty special seeing all those guys wearing Canada jerseys, and it’s an amazing tournament.”
The tournament was hosted in Edmonton and Red Deer — just a hop, skip and a jump from his hometown of Okotoks.
“That was special,” Krebs said. “I think having my family there; I think in the finals I had 40 people so that was pretty cool. All the support that was there and getting to see family after every game was pretty special.”
Canada bounced back from a loss during exhibition play to run the board when the tournament began.
In three games over three days, Team Canada dropped the Swiss at 10-0, Team Slovakia at 4-2 and secured a late game goal to pull ahead of Team Sweden at 4-3 to close out the preliminary round.
Team Canada went into the semifinal against Team USA and found themselves down by a goal with just over six minutes left in the affair.
However, Lethbridge Hurricanes forward Dylan Cozens managed to tally a buzzer-beating goal with help from Cranbrook product and Vancouver Giants defenceman Bowen Byram to tie up the game and send it into overtime.
Under two minutes into the extra period, Krebs fed a pass to Josh Williams, who buried his shot to send Canada into the championship game.
Even though the Swedes went up 2-0 early in the final, Team Canada stormed back to edge out the score by 3-2 after the opening 20 minutes.
After that, it was all Canada.
Byram notched an assist as Canada continued to fill the back of the net over the remaining two periods to win gold with a 6-2 score over Team Sweden.
It’s the third gold medal in a row Canada has won at the tournament over the last three years.
It’s a big year for both Krebs and Byram, who are eligible for the 2019 NHL Draft, and both are projected to be high first-round picks.
Krebs was in the running for the WHL Eastern Conference Rookie of th Year with an impressive 17 goals and 37 assists in 67 games last year. The Western Conference Rookie of the Year was awarded to Byram, who six goals and 21 assists in his first WHL campaign with Vancouver.
Even though Byram and the Giants only see the Ice once a year, the Cranbrook blueliner and Krebs know each other through previous Hockey Canada programs and events.
“We’ve got to play with each other for the past few years here, he’s a special player and a special kid,” said Krebs.