Tristan Zanee of Airdrie is just 15 years old but he already knows where he's going to college.  

Zandee, a very talented hockey player who spent last season with the Airdrie 'AAA' Midget Bisons of the Alberta Midget Hockey League and the year won before won the Provincial Bantam Championship with the Airdrie Xtreme, has signed a letter of intent to play for the Colorado College Tigers starting in the 2022-2023 hockey season.

Colorado College is an NCAA Division One team that is coached by Mike Haviland who has coached at both the AHL and NHL levels.  In the 2006-07 season while coaching the Norfolk Admirals he was named American Hockey League Coach of the Year.  From 2008 - 2012 Haviland was an assistant coach with the NHL's Chicago Black Hawks who he won a Stanley Cup with in 2010.

The level of coaching was something that Zandee says drew him to the Tigers, but other things factored into his decision to attend the school.

"First of all, they've got a new rink coming, a $60 million rink.  The education factor was huge.  They only do one course for three and a half weeks and then you're done with it so that's really attractive, considering you're doing hockey and school so you don't have to worry about five or six courses at a time.  The coaches are unbelievable.  They all believe in me, they think I can do good things.  They've all developed players to the next level so that's all I'm really hoping for is to get to the next level and I think they can do that for me."

Zandee says Colorado College has been recruiting him for some time now.  He and his family recently made a trip to Colorado Springs to check things out and he liked what he saw and made it official.

After winning the Alberta Bantam Championship with the Airdrie Xtreme, Zandee became eligible for the Western Hockey League Bantam Draft and was chosen in the second round, 28th overall by the Calgary Hitmen.  Zandee says deciding to go the NCAA route rather than play in the WHL was a difficult decision, but in the end, it just made sense to him.

"I've been teeter-tottering for the past year since I got drafted by Calgary.  It was a tough choice but I think ultimately education is important.  Both my parents are teachers and I think getting a degree from there to have in your back pocket, just in case hockey doesn't go well, I think that's what made it."

Don't get Zandee wrong though.  Playing hockey for a career, preferably in the NHL, is still his ultimate goal.  "I definitely think the NHL, especially with these coaches, is in reach.  that's my end goal, I want to play in the National Hockey League for a living, I want to make money doing it.  I love playing hockey, but, just in case it doesn't work out you do have that degree to get another really well-paying job in something you love to do.  NHL is the main goal and I think that's possible."

In the 2018 19 season, Zandee, who's listed as five feet 10 inches and 161 pounds on the website Elite Prospects,  had a breakout season with the Airdrie Bisons scoring 20 goals and adding 14 assists in 32 games. 

Zandee explains he still hasn't decided where he'll be playing hockey until joining Colorado College in 2022 but says it will likely be somewhere in either the British Columbia Junior Hockey League or the Alberta Junior Hockey League.   

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