When 16-year-old Will Bent logged on to Instagram one day last June, the Boston-area native was tagged in a post that originated a country away.

Bent, who wasn't familiar with Halifax or Nova Scotia, learned he'd been drafted by the Halifax Mooseheads.

"It was funny," he said. "I didn't really know it at first, so I laughed and my parents were like, 'Oh my God, you got drafted there.' It's huge."

At first, Bent wasn't interested in playing for the Mooseheads. That's because he'd committed to playi…