Brian Morenz (born May 11, 1949) is a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

retired professional

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...

Centre Center or centre may refer to: Mathematics *Center (geometry), the middle of an object * Center (algebra), used in various contexts ** Center (group theory) ** Center (ring theory) * Graph center, the set of all vertices of minimum eccentricity ...

. He played professionally in the

World Hockey Association The World Hockey Association (french: Association mondiale de hockey) was a professional ice hockey major league that operated in North America from 1972 to 1979. It was the first major league to compete with the National Hockey League (NHL) ...

(WHA) with the New York Raiders, New York Golden Blades and Jersey Knights franchise as well as the

San Diego Mariners The San Diego Mariners were an ice hockey team based in San Diego that played in the World Hockey Association from 1974 to 1977 at the San Diego Sports Arena. Previous to being in San Diego, the team was known as the New York Raiders, New York ...

. He is a distant cousin of

Howie Morenz Howard William Morenz (September 21, 1902 – March 8, 1937) was a Canadian professional ice hockey player. Beginning in 1923, he played centre for three National Hockey League (NHL) teams: the Montreal Canadiens (in two stints), the Chicago Blac ...

, the

Montreal Canadiens The Montreal CanadiensEven in English, the French spelling is always used instead of ''Canadians''. The French spelling of ''Montréal'' is also sometimes used in the English media. (french: link=no, Les Canadiens de Montréal), officially ...

great.

Playing career

Morenz was born in

Brampton, Ontario Brampton ( or ) is a city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Brampton is a city in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and is a lower-tier municipality within Peel Region. The city has a population of 656,480 as of the 2021 Census, making it th ...

, Canada. He played in the 1961

Quebec International Pee-Wee Hockey Tournament The Quebec International Pee-Wee Hockey Tournament (french: Tournoi international de hockey pee-wee de Québec) is an annual minor ice hockey event in Quebec City. The tournament was founded in 1960 to coincide with the Quebec Winter Carnival, ...

with his hometown youth team. Morenz played junior hockey with the

Oshawa Generals The Oshawa Generals are a junior ice hockey team in the Ontario Hockey League. They are based in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. The team is named for General Motors, an early sponsor (commercial), sponsor which has its Canadian headquarters in Oshawa. ...

of the

Ontario Hockey Association The Ontario Hockey Association (OHA) is the governing body for the majority of junior and senior level ice hockey teams in the Province of Ontario. The OHA is sanctioned by the Ontario Hockey Federation along with the Northern Ontario Hockey As ...

(OHA) from 1965 to 1968. He was drafted by the

Chicago Black Hawks (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

21st overall in the 1966 NHL Amateur Draft. He was a member of the 1966 OHA champion Generals, but he did not play with the team in the

Memorial Cup The Memorial Cup () is the national championship of the Canadian Hockey League, a consortium of three major junior ice hockey leagues operating in Canada and parts of the United States. It is a four-team round-robin tournament played between t ...

final as he was recovering from a fractured skull. After junior, he moved on to university, playing with the University of Denver Pioneers from 1968 until 1972. In 1972, he was drafted by New York Raiders in 1972 WHA Player Selection Draft, then started his pro career with the Raiders in 1972–73. He stayed with the franchise for four seasons, as it became the New York Golden Blades and New Jersey Golden Knights, then moved to San Diego to become the

. He sat out the 1976–77 season after the Mariners folded. He returned to hockey in 1976 with the San Diego Sharks and finished his hockey career with the San Diego Hawks of the Pacific Hockey League in 1978–79. He played 223 games in the WHA, scoring 53 goals and 57 assists for 110 points.

Awards

* OHA champion Oshawa Generals, 1966 * NCAA Champion University of Denver Pioneers, 1969 * Brampton Sports Hall of Fame, 1991

References

External links

* 1949 births Chicago Blackhawks draft picks Denver Pioneers men's ice hockey players Jersey Knights players New York Golden Blades players New York Raiders players Oshawa Generals players San Diego Mariners players Living people Canadian ice hockey centres {{Canada-icehockey-centre-1940s-stub