Notre Dame Fighting Irish - Official Athletics Website

Bjork Added To U.S. National Team Roster

April 17, 2017

By Dan Colleran

NOTRE DAME, Ind. — Notre Dame junior forward Anders Bjork will join classmate Cal Petersen and Irish alum Anders Lee as part of the U.S. Men’s National Team for the upcoming 2017 IIHF Men’s World Championship, which will take place on May 5-21 in Cologne, Germany, and Paris, France.

After an initial roster release of 15 players, including Petersen and Lee, USA Hockey has announced additions to the Team USA roster, including Bjork on Monday afternoon (April 17).

Bjork and Petersen will become the 14th and 15th Notre Dame players to suit up for the U.S. National Team, while Lee previously helped Team USA to the bronze medal in the 2015 IIHF World Championship in the Czech Republic. The previous 13 former Notre Dame players to suit up for Team USA have combined for 18 U.S. National Team appearances. Most recently, Vince Hinostroza played for Team USA at the 2016 IIHF World Championship in Russia.

A fifth-round pick by the Boston Bruins in the 2014 NHL Draft (146th overall), Bjork posted a career-high 52 points on 21 goals and 31 assists in 2016-17. He was named a Second Team East CCM/AHCA All-American and earned First Team Hockey East All-Star honors.

Bjork skated in 39 games as a junior, totaling 21 goals and 31 assists to lead the Irish in scoring with his career-high 52 points. His 52 points tied for fourth in Hockey East and tied for ninth in the country. He had six game-winning goals, which tied for fifth in the country. The Irish were 22-5-2 in 2017-17 when he registered at least one point and 11-3-0 when he scored at least one goal.

In Notre Dame’s two games at the 2017 NCAA Northeast Regional in Manchester, New Hampshire, Bjork led the Irish with a two-goal performance against No. 1 seed Minnesota, including the game-winning goal, and tallied the primary assist on all three goals in a 3-2 overtime win over UMass Lowell. He had five points on the weekend and was named the NCAA Northeast Regional Most Outstanding Player.

Bjork posted 16 multi-point games this season, including four-point efforts against Arizona State (Oct. 8) and UConn (Oct. 28). Bjork is the first Irish player to reach the 50-point plateau since 2010-11, when T.J. Tynan had 54 points.

Skating in 115 career games, Bjork has scored 40 goals and added 69 assists for 109 points, which ranks tied for 42nd on Notre Dame’s career points list. He notched his 100th point with an assist versus Providence (Feb. 18), becoming the 51st player in program history to reach 100 career points and the first junior to do so since Tynan and Lee in 2013.

He joins father, Kirt, as the only father-son duo to earn All-America recognition while skating for the Irish, as well as cousin Erik Condra, who was a second-team pick in 2008-09. The Bjorks are one of five father-son combinations to earn All-America honors, and one of two to complete a pair this season, joining fellow 2017 Second Team (West) honoree Luc Snuggerud of Omaha and father, Dave, who was a 1989 second-teamer from Minnesota, as the fourth and fifth father-son All-Americans.

Bjork and Petersen are two of the five players on the roster who played college hockey in 2016-17, joining Daniel Brickley (Minnesota State), Jordan Greenway (Boston University) and Clayton Keller (Boston University).

Bjork will be representing Team USA for the third time. He was previously a member of the 2016 U.S. National Junior Team that won a bronze medal at the 2016 IIHF World Junior Championship in Helsinki, Finland. Bjork’s tournament was highlighted by a two-goal performance and U.S. Player of the Game honors in the bronze-medal victory over Sweden. He also collected two goals in seven games as a member of the gold medal-winning U.S. Men’s National Under-18 Team at the 2014 IIHF Men’s Under-18 World Championship in Lappeenranta and Imatra, Finland.

— ND —


Dan Colleran, associate athletics communications director at the University of Notre Dame, has been a part of Fighting Irish Media since August 2015 and coordinates all media and publicity efforts surrounding the Notre Dame hockey and golf programs. A native of Walpole, Massachusetts, Colleran spent the previous three years working with the men’s hockey and soccer programs at Providence College. Colleran also spent two years as an Assistant Executive Director of Communications & Championships at the Ivy League and is a graduate of Providence College (’06 & ’08G).