For the third straight year, a hockey player from this province has won the Calder Cup championship.
Clark Bishop’s Charlotte Checkers beat the Chicago Wolves 5-3 Saturday in Chicago to win the American Hockey League championship.
Charlotte, the Carolina Hurricanes’ minor league affiliate, took the best-of-seven series 4-1.
Bishop, a 23-year-old forward from St. John’s, assisted in Zach Nastasiuk’s empty-net goal. Bishop had two goals and an assist in 16 playoff games.
It’s been quite a year for Bishop, the third-year pro who was Carolina’s fifth-round draft selection, 127th overall, in 2014.
He saw his first taste of action in the NHL, 20 games in total with the Hurricanes, scoring his first National Hockey League goal. He also appeared in two Stanley Cup playoff games with Carolina.
Colin Greening of the St. John’s won the Calder Cup last year with the Toronto Marlies, his second AHL championship. Greening also won in 2011 with the Binghamton Senators. Daniel Cleary of Riverhead, Harbour Grace won in 2017 with the Grand Rapids Griffins.
Bishop is now the eighth Newfoundlander to win the Calder Cup, joining Greening, Cleary, Grand Falls-Windsor native Don Howse, who won back-to-back Calder Cups with the Nova Scotia Voyageurs in 1976 and 1977, Brian Gibbons of St. John's (1971 Springfield Kings), Jason Morgan of Conception Bay South (2001, Saint John Flames), John Slaney of St. John's (2005, Philadelphia Phantoms) and Zach O’Brien of St. John’s (2015 Manchester Monarchs).
O’Brien was a member of the Newfoundland Growlers who won the Kelly Cup ECHL championship last week.
Twitter: @telysports
