SJHL AGM

The SJHL held its AGM this past weekend in Regina and I spoke with SJHL President Bill Chow, who was kind enough to give me a call, about some of the main points of the weekend.  He said it was a long but productive series of meetings.

Here are the main points from our conversation:

• The 54 game schedule "parameters" are set.  It seems there were still some sticking points on how everything would work, so while we don't yet have a schedule for 2012-13; the outline is set.
• The SJHL dropped the Showcase.  The initial plan was to hold the Showcase in Melfort this year, but with the weekend cancelled that won't be happening.
• It's really too bad because the Showcase is an absolute blast for the broadcasters.  Lots of great hockey and it's one of the few times we can all get together at the same time and catch up.
• The Showcase will be replaced by an "Identification Camp" for '94 and '95 born players with some older players mixed in.  Select players from this camp head to the World Junior A Challenge selection camp for Team West.

Junior A Supplement Extended Two Years

Hockey Canada held its AGM this past week/weekend.  The big news items coming from the meetings are the extension of the Junior-A Supplement and the Vernon Vipers will host the 2014 RBC Cup.

Here's the summary of the weekend in release form (the important stuff is in the second half):

Western Canada Cup

The Western Canadian Championships has a real name and logo.


Courtesy CJHL Communications:


The Canadian Junior Hockey League and Nanaimo Clippers held a media conference Thursday in Nanaimo - the host community of the 2013 Western Canada Cup - to introduce the community, media and fans to the newly formed event and a chance to welcome the executives from the four western leagues to the host city. 

SJHL Says No to Cold Lake Expansion

In what may have been a situation of 'only a matter of time', the SJHL has released a statement ending any speculation on the league's possible expansion to the community of Cold Lake, Alberta.

From the SJHL Website:

The Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League says it's content with the current twelve team set up and will not be moving into Alberta in the near future.

News reports, in recent days, have come out of Cold Lake concerning a possible expansion into that community.  SJHL President Bill Chow acknowledges a group has, indeed, shown interest in the league.  “We have decided not to prolong the process or a decision about a franchise in Cold Lake.” 

The Alberta Junior Hockey League, which runs pretty much a mirror league to the SJHL, currently has a franchise 51-kilometres outside of Cold Lake (Bonnyville) and the two leagues have an extremely good working partnership.  “It would be difficult to grant a franchise to the group with the existing Bonnyville franchise so close,” says Chow.

Chow says there are other logistics involved of having a team in Alberta playing in the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League and there is considerable required involvement of numerous levels of hockey to establish a new franchise based out of the boundaries of Saskatchewan. 

Chow also says he's grateful of the Cold Lake group showing interest in the SJHL as a viable means of entertainment for the community; however expansion outside of Saskatchewan isn't on the horizon.

--

Unfortunately for Cold Lake, this means the odds of Junior-A hockey coming to the city in the near future are slim.  The AJHL seems to be shying away from bringing another team into the Bonnyville/Lloydminster area and there were just too many issues for the Cold Lake franchise to overcome to join the SJHL.

With the AJHL's vehement rejection of an SJHL franchise in Cold Lake, it was likely just not something the SJ was willing to go to battle for.  As the release states, the league is pretty content with the twelve team league.  That's not to say expansion somewhere in Saskatchewan isn't a possibility, but it doesn't look to be on the table for the next couple of seasons.

Do you think the SJHL should consider expansion within Saskatchewan?  Where should the league look at bringing a franchise?  Let me know in the comments section.

-D

AJHL Against Cold Lake's SJHL Bid

The Alberta Junior Hockey League is making its stance clear on the issue of Cold Lake joining the SJHL.  First reported by Robb Hunter, the voice of the Bonnyville Pontiacs,  the AJHL isn't comfortable with efforts to bring a Junior-A hockey team to Cold Lake to play in the SJHL.  While the Alberta league has zero issue with the SJHL expanding within its own borders, the AJHL is concerned with the proximity of Cold Lake to franchises in Bonnyville and Lloydminster and what that means for marketing dollars and the local talent pool.

The SJHL features a few sets of teams in pretty close proximity.  Think Weyburn/Estevan, Nipawin/Humboldt/Melfort and of course, Melville/Yorkton.  All of these teams make it work, at least from the outside looking in. "I think it would be a different scenario if the AJHL, within the confines of the boundaries of the Alberta borders, were to say 'let's go ahead and do that' and go into Cold Lake," AJHL President Craig T. Cripps said over the phone this morning, "but when you have another province's league coming in I think that certainly warrants discussion not only with the AJHL, but perhaps with Hockey Alberta."  Cripps was very candid in his discussion of the situation regarding the SJHL's possible expansion.  He explained the AJHL's own Board of Governors would, more than likely not vote to place a team into the area "out of respect" for the Pontiacs and the Bobcats.

That's tough news for the people behind the push to bring Junior-A hockey to Cold Lake.  As mentioned in the first story on possible expansion, there's a beautiful rink entering the final stages of construction in the city and there's every intention that it will house an AJHL or SJHL franchise some day.  However, as ownership group leader Derek Prue mentioned last week, the AJHL isn't very interested in expanding from 16 teams.  "The AJHL Board of Governors has decided that expansion isn't on the table at this time," Cripps commented, "Certainly we have communities that would like to have a franchise in the AJHL, but we have to look at the depth of our product.  We have to look at the number of individuals that are playing the game at this level and we don't want to dilute our talent pool to the effect where we just don't feel we have a very competitive Junior-A league in Alberta."

With expansion seemingly out of the question (Cripps did mention the Board can always re-evaluate), relocation would have to be the next option.  The St. Albert Steel situation comes to mind, though Cripps couldn't offer any updates.  The AJHL Board of Governors has a conference call scheduled for Wednesday to discuss the St. Albert.  Though relocation certainly isn't the potential ownership group's first choice, I have a feeling they would take that route if it's the only option.  The problem with relocation is this... if there are other communities (ie: Whitecourt) in the running to move a franchise (ie: St. Albert) those options would likely be more attractive to the league to avoid the cluster of teams in the North-East.  The thing Cold Lake certainly has going for it is the new facility, but is that enough to counteract the theory that there isn't enough money to go around?

With the AJHL route seemingly not an option, the theoretical Cold Lake franchise is left exploring options in the SJHL.  With the AJHL in opposition to that avenue, the options become severely limited.  Though the AJHL doesn't have final say in the matter (as far as I know), the league's voice is certainly an important one when it comes to the various approvals the Cold Lake franchise would need.  Alberta Minor Hockey will likely take the AJHL's recommendations into serious consideration along with the CJHL.

It will certainly be interesting to see where the issue progresses with Alberta Minor Hockey as the progression firmly rests with that legislative group for the time being.

You can listen to my full interview with AJHL President Craig T. Cripps on the Audio on Demand page.

-D

Junior-A Supplement Pilot Project Coming to a Close

When the Junior-A Supplement was announced before the 2010-11 season, it was met with a certain... "resistance" from fans, coaches and players.  While fans weren't happy with the rules limiting the number of fights a player could participate in before being suspended and other rule adjustments, it could have been more severe.

The Supplement was part of an experiment where five Junior-A leagues (SJHL, AJHL, BCHL, MJHL and the Maritime Junior Hockey League) to investigate the effectiveness of limiting fights in the fashion that the Supplement entailed versus the 'vanilla version' of Rule 6.7.  That's the rule limiting players to one fight per game.  When they drop the mitts, players are assessed a game misconduct.  First period?  Gone.  Second Period? Gone.  Third period, yeah, you've got it now... Gone.  In the Supplement Leagues, a player needs to fight a second time before getting the boot.  This isn't anything unfamiliar.  The SJHL featured the one-fight rule close to ten years ago (so I'm told), before going to a two-fight system.  The difference when the SJHL had the one-and-done rule is there was no real accumulation.  Players could fight pretty much as often as they wanted.

The two year pilot project of the Junior-A Supplement is in its final stages with reports and data being handed over to Hockey Canada in the next few weeks.  From there, Hockey Canada will use this research to decide how everything will shake down.  At least in theory.  From recent comments, it seems as though Hockey Canada already knows what's going to happen.