Rockland Nationals

The original Rockland Nationals were founded in 1973 to replace the Hull Festivals, who had just left the Central Junior A Hockey League for the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. In just three seasons, the Nationals, coached by Bryan Murray, won the league, the Dudley Hewitt Cup as Central Canadian champions, and the Centennial Cup 1976 National Championship. Unfortunately for them, in those days the teams played sets of best-of-seven series to determine the national champion.

The Nationals were in their infantile stage as an organization and found themselves not only national champions but financially bankrupt from months of travel across the country. They survived one more season on life support funds from the CJHL before packing it in for the 1977-78 season. The fall of the Nationals convinced the CJHL to petition the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association to consider alternate, cheaper, playdown methods to determine regional and national champions. The CAHA answered back a few seasons later with the formation of round robin championship tournaments. To this date, the Rockland Nationals are the only team in CJHL history to have won a Tier II Junior "A" National title.

A decade later the Nationals were reborn. In 1987, the Nationals entered the Eastern Ontario Junior C Hockey League and won the league title in their first season back in action.

• Rockland Nationals (official)