CALGARY, Alta. – The road to Buffalo, N.Y., comes through Calgary as Canada’s National Sledge Team assembles for its final training camp of the season at the Markin MacPhail Centre at WinSport's Canada Olympic Park in preparation for the inaugural Sledge Hockey Pan-Pacific Championship.

The Pan-Pacific Championship, hosted in Buffalo from March 29-April 2, marks the last event on the international sledge hockey calendar for the 2015-16 season, and features Canada, Japan, South Korea, and the United States.

Hockey Canada is assembling 21 players from Canada’s National Sledge Team Feb. 21-27 for a final training camp which includes on- and off-ice sessions; the first on-ice session is scheduled for 8:45 a.m. MT on Tuesday, Feb. 23.

“It’s important for the growth of the sport to see more high-level events, like the Pan-Pacific Championship, be added to the calendar so that every sledge hockey nation can continue to develop and match itself against the competition,” said Ken Babey, head coach of Canada’s National Sledge Team, which earned a silver medal at the 2016 World Sledge Hockey Challenge in January. “As a team, we have had a tremendous season; not all of the results were what we’d wanted, but the effort was there and I’ve seen a lot of growth in our players. We are heading into this camp in Calgary and into this final event in Buffalo with fire in our bellies to end the season on a high note and set us up for next year.”

In Calgary this week are 17 players who represented Canada at the 2016 World Sledge Hockey Challenge (Armstrong, Arsenault, Block, Bowden, Bridges, Cozzolino, Delaney, Dixon, Dorion, Gemmell, Larocque, McGregor, Sholomicki, Sorley, Watson, Westlake, Whitson); as well as goaltender Kris Dutkiewicz (Kitchener, Ont.), defencemen Tanner Fandrey (Red Deer, Alta.) and Tyrone Henry (Ottawa, Ont.), and forward Mathieu Trudeau (Candiac, Que.).

All practices at the Markin MacPhail Centre are open to the public. Players and staff will be available for media interviews after every on-ice session.

For more information on the Canada’s National Sledge Hockey Team, please visit HockeyCanada.ca, or follow along via social media at Facebook.com/HCSledge and Twitter.com/HC_Sledge.