Western Canada Cup

The Western Canada Cup (WCC) is the Junior A ice hockey championship for the champions of the Alberta Junior Hockey League, British Columbia Hockey League, Manitoba Junior Hockey League, and Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League. A 5-team round robin, the event will first be played in Nanaimo, British Columbia in 2013. The winner and runner-up from the event move on to the Royal Bank Cup, the National Junior A Championship. The tournament will feature a page playoff system to determine the two Royal Bank Cup seeds.

History
Much like the now-retired Abbott Cup, the WCC is the championship for all of Western Canada. The Abbott Cup was a playdown championship consisting of a best-of-7 series played between the winners of the Doyle Cup (AJHL and BCHL) and Anavet Cup (MJHL and SJHL) to determine a single seed into the old national championship, the Centennial Cup. The Abbott Cup winner from 1971 until 1979 played the Eastern Canada Champion, the winner of the Dudley Hewitt Cup. From 1979 until 1989, the Abbott Cup winner players a round robin against the winner of the Dudley Hewitt Cup (Central Canada) and the J. Pius Callaghan Cup (Atlantic Canada). In 1989, the Abbott Cup was divided up and both the Doyle Cup and Anavet Cup winner were allowed into the Nationals. From 1995 until 2012, the format was that the Royal Bank Cup would host the winners of the Doyle Cup, Anavet Cup, Dudley Hewitt Cup, and a new Eastern Canada Championship called the Fred Page Cup.

In 2012, the leagues of the West proposed to Hockey Canada and the Canadian Junior Hockey League that the Doyle Cup and Anavet Cup be abolished and in 2013 the Western Canadian Championship be created. On January 16, 2012, Hockey Canada announced the tournament to the world and that the first event was hosted by Nanaimo, British Columbia.

According to published reports; the 2017 edition of the tournament will be the last one. The Alberta Junior Hockey League, Manitoba Junior Hockey League, and Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League all voted against continuing the present format. The tournament has lost its main sponsor. The belief is the qualifying will go back to the old method of the British Columbia champion playing the Alberta champion for one spot and the Saskatchewan champion playing the Manitoba champion for another spot. No word it the Anavet Cup and Doyle Cup will be reinstated.

It was later announced that the 2017 Western Canada Cup will be the final edition of the tournament as the format will be abandoned. The 2018 Western Canada Cup was slated to be hosted in Manitoba by bidding MJHL teams, but all had financial concerns about hosting the tournament. The AJHL, SJHL, and MJHL voted to abandoned the tournament, while the BCHL was highly-receptive of continuing the format. The Doyle Cup and Anavet Cup playoff series will be revived for the 2017-18 season.