Defenseman Adrian Aucoin received a scholarship to play ice hockey at Boston University in 1991 and, after his first season, was offered the choice of staying with the school or joining the National Hockey League’s Vancouver Canucks. He chose neither, deciding instead to suit up with the Canadian men’s national ice hockey team. He accompanied them to the 1993 Junior World Championships, where the country took home gold, and the 1994 Winter Olympics, where they earned silver. At the latter tournament he played in five matches. Upon his return he skated with the American Hockey League’s Hamilton Canucks to finish the season, and then spent the majority of the following year with the league’s Syracuse Crunch. He also made his NHL debut during this season, playing in one game with the Vancouver Cancucks, and then split the following year 60-40 between the Canucks and the Crunch. From 1996 until 2001 he skated exclusively with the Canucks with the exception of joining the national team at the 2000 World Championships. In 1999 he was awarded the Babe Pratt Trophy as the Canucks’ top defenseman.
During the 2000-2001 season Aucoin was traded to the NHL’s Tampa Bay Lightning, but by the 2001-2002 season he was affiliated with the league’s New York Islanders. He stayed with the squad until the 2004-2005 NHL lockout, during which he played fourteen games with Sweden’s MODO Hockey Ornskoldsvik. Upon his return he had a two-season stint with the NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks and then another with the Calgary Flames. In July 2009 he signed with the league’s Phoenix Coyotes in preparation for the 2009-2010 season.
Canada