OJHL ANNOUNCES DATES FOR 2021-2022 SEASON

June 14, 2021

10:21 AM EDT

The Ontario Junior Hockey League (OJHL) Annual General Meeting (AGM) wrapped up this weekend with the Board of Governors looking ahead to the 2020-21 season while paying tribute to one of its leaders.

The league has developed a Social Media and Branding Plan utilizing an extensive social media ecosystem in conjunction with a specific workflow plan. The plan will see OJHL content shared in real time during and after games to bring the OJHL’s players, teams and excitement to a much larger audience.

Over the last number of years, the league has developed a number of properties and events including: the OJHL Governors’ Showcase, OJHL All-Star Celebration weekend, Ontario Junior Development League, OJHL Combine, Junior Hockey Pre-Camp Showcase, OJHL Fan Favourite Award and the OJHL Championship Series. These properties are supported by OJHL programming such as the OJHL CHCH nationally televised Game of the Week, its national televised weekly show – The OJ Today and OJHL Images.  The newly designed Social Media and Brand Plan is next evolution in the promotion of the league, teams and players.

“Over the past several months, our OJHL team has developed a very extensive and unique Social Media and Branding plan that will tap into our industry-leading OJHL Images to capture in-game content for distribution through our newly developed social media ecosystem,” stated OJHL Director of Business Development Rick Morocco.  We expect our plan will increase the OJHL brand 10-fold during the next year.”

The Board of Governors also approved the 2021-22 OJHL Season Opening date and special events:

§  Start date for the full 54-game 2021-22 season is set for October 1, 2021.

§  The Governors’ Showcase will take place during the third or fourth week of October.

§  The OJHL All-Star Celebration weekend will be played during the third or fourth week of January in Collingwood, Ontario.

§  The full schedule will be released in the coming weeks.

The 2021-2022 season will see a change with the league’s Chairman of the Board.  Long-time Markham Royals Governor Stuart Hyman moves from his role as the OJHL’s 1st Vice Chair into the Chairman’s position, taking over the position from outgoing Chairman Marc Mercier.  Hyman’s first order of business was presenting a motion to re-name the current OJHL Chairman’s Award to the Marc Mercier Chairman’s Award in honour of the outgoing Chairman, the long-time governor of the Cobourg Cougars. The motion was passed unanimously.

“The OJHL Chairman’s Award is provided to an individual who has gone above and beyond for the betterment of the OJHL and hockey in Ontario,” said newly elected OJHL Chairman Stuart Hyman. “Marc Mercier’s dedication to the OJHL and all 22 member clubs has always gone above and beyond during over 15 years of service.  The OJHL Board of Governors wanted to recognize all of his efforts and the dedication our Chairman’s Award in his honour is a very fitting manner in which to do so.”

“On behalf of our 22 clubs and league staff, I would like to thank outgoing Chairman Marc Mercier for all of his leadership, guidance and dedication during his term as Chairman of the OJHL,” said OJHL Commissioner Marty Savoy. “Marc has been a leader in driving improvement of not only the OJHL but Junior hockey within our province.  The OJHL has a history of dedicated individuals that have served as our Chairman and the league staff and myself look forward to working with in-coming Chairman Stuart Hyman”

About the OJHL – “League of Choice”

The Ontario Junior Hockey League is the largest Junior ‘A’ league operating under the auspices of the Canadian Junior Hockey League with 22 member clubs. A proud member of the CJHL and Ontario Hockey Association, the OJHL was originally named the Ontario Provincial Junior ‘A’ Hockey League and it was formed out of the Central Junior ‘B’ Hockey League in 1993-94. With a long and storied history of developing players for the next level, including U SPORTS, the NCAA, CHL, minor pro ranks and the NHL, the OJHL had more than 100 commitments in 2019-20.