Former Nhlers will feel a draft in St. John’s tonight

They’re here for Hockey Heroes Weekend, which includes a 16-team tournament in benefit of the Heart and Stroke Foundation

Sixteen former NHL stars are in St. John’s this weekend for the fifth annual Hockey Heroes Weekend, a big fundraising event for the Newfoundland and Labrador Heart and Stroke Foundation.

St. John’s is one of four cities playing host to a Hockey Heroes Weekend, joining Halifax, Moncton and Saskatoon, Sask.

Sixteen teams will take part in a weekend tournament at Twin Rinks, starting tonight and running until Sunday, with each team dressing one of the NHL stars.

All players raised funds to take part in the event, with the fundraising goal for this year set for $308,000. Each team was asked to raise a minimum of $16,000 to participate, or approximately $1,000 per player.

All proceeds remain in the province and fund research, public education programming and life-saving initiatives.

An alumni draft is set for tonight at the St. John’s Convention Centre, where each team will draft an NHL alumni player for their team for their entire weekend. The draft proceeds in a top-down order, with the top fundraising team choosing first.

Ken Reid of Sportsnet will emcee that event.

Tournament play starts Saturday and continues Sunday.

The top fundraising players and goalies are given the opportunity to play in the Heart Heroes game with the complete roster of NHL alumni 6:30 p.m. Saturday.

NHL alumni taking part this year are John Scott, Paul Coffey, John Leclair, Larry Murphy, Kirk Muller, Billy Smith, Brad May, Al Iafrate, Sergio Momesso, Steve Thomas, P.J. Stock, Jamal Mayers, Gary Leeman, Darren Langdon, Dale Hawerchuk and Marty Mcsorley.