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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 29, 2022 4:37:37 GMT -5
They were in the West Prince Senior Hockey League and neither the website or facebook has been updated in about a year.
They finally announced (late Wednesday night) that they will have three teams (Kensington, Tignish, and Wellington) playing this year. The league starts Friday night.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 29, 2022 4:33:04 GMT -5
The heads of the AAA leagues in the country should be in talks with HC and teams on how to make this continue into the future. It’s so old and many people I know still see it as a prestigious event in the country. So why not find a way to work together to make it to the 100th and beyond. Agreed. With many things rising up out of the pandemic it seems it would be a good time to do something to change up the Allan Cup as many things have changed over the past couple years. This would be the perfect time to work on revising the format of qualifying and the tournament itself. The sad part the Allan Cup is older than Hockey Canada and they have treated it as an after thought for years. I understand with the lack of teams competing at this level, but isn't one of Hockey Canada's responsibilities to build the game in Canada? They are always tried to focus on making hockey an inclusive sport. That game building has almost always ended up being directed at small kids, which is the main area they should focus on as it builds a love of the game for life. Look at how many Major Junior, Junior A, Junior B, Junior C, and U18AAA teams exist across Canada. How many players came out of those ranks that have played university hockey in Canada or college in the US? These are people that have grown up playing competitve hockey all their lives. Adult competetive hockey is a level that is seriously lacking at this point. I am amazed that there isn't a women's version of this level as well. There is lot of women's talent in Canada that could make this level a possibility and that talent pool is grown as more girls are being exposed to higher level hockey with new leagues that have grown over the past decade or so.
The talent is out there. Working to build a system that makes it practical for league play as well as provincial, regional and nation championships for people that become adults with full time jobs and families. It's great that small towns are able to host a national championship but the logistics for hosting those events can be expensive. Travel, lodging, food, and ice time all add up fast. How about this for an idea have NHL, AHL, Major Junior, and University teams host the events at their facilites. The Premier Hockey Federation have most of their teams playing their games out of NHL practice rinks, why not have it at that sort of facility. For example, have the Montreal Canadiens host the tournament and have the round robin at their practice facility, the Complexe Sportif Bell and then have the playdown games and championship game at the Centre Bell.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 28, 2022 19:32:16 GMT -5
Try hitting the proboards main site. I have already forwarded them the information that Doug passed away and there is no administrator for the site. I offered to do it and they were looking into what to do with the website. They have been deleting the spam post for the gambling website that keeps showing up. I think having a couple of administrators may be a good thing in case anything else happens.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 23, 2022 18:39:17 GMT -5
Also on a side note the NCSHL has opted NOT to go to AA provincials this year. Just to clarify, the North Central or the North Peace league? Didn’t hear that news either way so I’m curious. Good finding on your part either way! The North Peace not participating is nothing out of the ordinary.
The Ranchland was having a problem with Hockey Alberta stemming from the exlusion of the Innisfail Eagles in last year's playoffs.
The Sask/Alta usually has the furthest advancing Alberta based team in the playoffs participate in the senior AA provincials
The East Central League is considered Senior A and has not had any teams participate in Senior AA provincials.
The North Central not participating would be quite a blow the tournament. They have already had the Fort Sask Chief withdraw due to lack of players.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 23, 2022 4:27:08 GMT -5
You’d hope they would open the bid process for teams for the next years tournament as well or the next two. Get some stability and allow teams to grow again. However that’s If they chose to support senior hockey that is. Stability in senior hockey in the pandemic age? It is unstable under the best of conditions.
With the way the economy is going some small and medium size businesses may be a little bit tighter on the sponsorships. Any event tied to Hockey Canada at this point is not a link that many companies might want to be associated with until some of the major issues within Hockey Canada are corrected.
It would be nice if coming out of the conditions over the last few years could lead to a renaissance of senior hockey. If senior hockey at the AAA and AA levels could work to build back up the game. Possibly have some of the leagues that play at the senior AA level have a team or two out of each league be created to compete in senior AAA playoffs so that each province could have at least a few teams at least competing for a provincial championship and work towards building up the game with small steps and hopefully building senior AAA leagues in most if not all provinces.
Senior hockey has been in a tough spot since the 1950's. Several factors have made it different from junior, university, and professional hockey in that television and the players themselves are a little different from other levels of play.
Television stared the decline of senior hockey in that you could watch NHL games on television for free when television first started up. The players themselves are different in that they have other year round jobs to pay the bills and in most cases they are not full time students. People make sacrifices to provide for their families and what could be considered a hobby (an expensive one at that) would take second place to their family's needs. Whereas junior and university players are usually younger and don't have the family consideration to affect and can do classes remotely.
Possibly some of the changes caused by the pandemic could make it easier for some of the senior players as they don't have to lose time at work with working remotely or 4-ten hour days for many office jobs becoming the norm. Depending on how playoffs are set up provincial, regional, and national playoff rounds could lead to players needing a lot of time away from their jobs. A couple of days for provincial and regional playoffs with a week plus for the Allan Cup itself. I know it would be living out a dream in many cases to win a national championship, but using up about two weeks worth of vacation time to play hockey and not have it as family time would be a tough decision for many players.
Not having the Allan Cup for the last 3 years would have to pretty much put the senior AAA level at its' lowest point ever. Now the rebuilding is beginning at the local level and hopefully it comes to be as the senior AAA game has adapted to obstacles thrown in front of it. Such as during WWII when many military teams played for the Allan Cup. Another adaption has been the mid to small sized towns being the life blood for senior hockey as professional, minor league and major junior became the team for larger communities across Canada. Hopefully the economic situation will change for the better and businesses and fans have money available to sponsor and attend games to help the teams build a financial base to ensure success for the future.
The Allan Cup is the second oldest championship being contested for in Canada and is deserving of more respect than it has received from Hockey Canada over the years. It is barely even acknowledged by Hockey Canada any more and has been that way for about a decade if not longer. With a series of events occurring (the pandemic and the shake up in the executive of Hockey Canada) the not to distant future is the time to do something to rebuild the senior level nationwide. Going to the old East-West format has been mentioned as one solution and could make it easier to get teams to compete.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 22, 2022 19:33:37 GMT -5
They were in the West Prince Senior Hockey League and neither the website or facebook has been updated in about a year.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 21, 2022 3:47:38 GMT -5
Hockey Canada has pretty much well ignored Senior AAA hockey for years. Hopefully with the restructuring of Hockey Canada with the replacing of the executives more attention may be paid to Senior AAA hockey.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 20, 2022 19:51:16 GMT -5
Great job! That takes a bit of effort and research to compile it all! One note - the North Peace link is going to the North Central page. Otherwise, bang-up job! corrected
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 19, 2022 5:16:50 GMT -5
For those of you that are interested here are links for the various Senior leagues across Canada
Newfoundland Central Newfoundland Hockey League: No website, several teams use facebook
Newfoundland West Coast Senior Hockey League: No website, several teams use facebook
New Brunswick The Ligue de Hockey Senior Acadie Chaleur is not playing this year.
Circuit de Hockey Senior Roger-Lizotte:https://www.leaguelineup.com/welcome.asp?url=crlhockey
PEI The West Prince Senior Hockey League doesn't appear to be operating this year.
The WPSHL annouced a schedule begining December 30th.
Quebec The Ligue de Hockey Senior Laval does not appear to be operating this year.
Ligue de Hockey Senior du Lac au Fleuve: lhslf.com/
Ontario
Western Ontario Super Hockey League:
Manitoba
The Carillion and North Central Leagues are not playing this year as both leagues are down to just two teams.
Saskatchewan The Qu'Appelle Valley and Highway Hockey Leagues fully merged for this year.
Alberta Sask/Alta Senior Hockey League (This is a new website):
British Columbia
Note: The old cihl.info website is no longer being updated
Nunavut
United States
The Black Diamond Hockey League and the Mountain West Hockey League both appear to have collapsed.
A new Western US based league appears to be in the works for 2023-24 with a flagship team based out of Las Vegas and possibly including some of the teams from the BDHL and MWHL. This league may be a semi-professional/low level professional league once it gets going.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 19, 2022 4:27:27 GMT -5
Right now there is no administrator on this forum as Doug Mathieson, the founder of this page passed away about 2 years ago. I have been in touch with proboards about the issues we have had with the spammer that keeps hitting the site and lack of an adminstrator. We are free to add topics to the site. I'd be all in for additional topics such as the many Senior AA leagues across Canada. There is also a board dedicated to Senior hockey in Saskatchewan. seniorhockeysask.proboards.com/Newfoundland hockey talk is another site with a dedicated chat forum. www.nlhockeytalk.ca/hockey/An overseer (sp?) is watching the board for the spam post. If you want to report a spam post hit the cog icon in the upper right corner of each post and report it as spam.
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Post by southoftheborder on Dec 6, 2022 6:30:20 GMT -5
I could be wrong but doesn't the provincial/regional champion in the Maritimes usually get the option or an offer to go to the AC? Its good to see interest and lots of strong senior leagues. There has only been 1 Atlantic Cup playoff since 2005 which was in 2016 when Lameque au P'tit Mousse declared Senior AAA and the Grand Falls-Windsor Cataracts won the previous season Herder and represented the province.
2018 had three teams but two teams withdrew prior to any tournament being scheduled.
Newfoundland usually has the previous season Herder winner represents the province.
New Brunswick would have a team or two declare for Senior AAA depending on where the tournament is being held
Nova Scotia and PEI haven't had a team declare at Senior AAA (and still be playing in by playoff time) in about 15 years.
The only times there was more than two teams in the last dozen or so years was when the Allan Cup was held in Atlantic Canada in 2015 and 2017 and there were short trips to the tournament and guaranteed entry in the Allan Cup tournament itself.
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Post by southoftheborder on Oct 6, 2022 5:01:12 GMT -5
Congratulations are once again in order for Senior hockey’s royal family. The Bentley/Lacombe Generals who, as of today, have been the reigning Allan Cup Champions for 966 days. Although The Army has a seemingly increasingly realistic expectation to be crowned “The Forever Champions” when Allan Cup is respectfully laid to rest…966 days is still about 610 days longer than the previous record. That is all. Sorry to burst your bubble Wade, but; you were a little premature on this one. The Generals did not become the longest reigning champion until March 23, 2022 as the University of Toronto won the championship on March 25 1925 and won the next two tournaments in 1926 and 1927 and they were then defeated in the OHA Senior Final on March 6, 1928 by the Kitchener Greenshirts making them the champions for 1077 days. And the final ended on March 28th making it 1099 days until a different champion was crowned making it April 16, 2022 the Generals became the longest defending champions.
And the Warroad Lakers held it for 1092 days from April 16, 1994 (winning the 1994 final) to April 12, 1997 (losing the 1997 final) and winning the 1995 and 1996 finals as well.
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Post by southoftheborder on Oct 3, 2022 17:50:07 GMT -5
Now hearing ACH Ontario could add 4th team in Brampton. Would be great place to setup as the ECHL Brampton Beast ceased operations last year. Many former Beast players ended up playing Senior AAA after playing for Brampton in previous seasons Hope this rumour comes to fruition wouldn't some of the players go to Allen texas is Ottawa's current farm team in the ECHL The ECHL teams usually have several unaffiliated players signed to contracts with the ECHL team not the NHL team.
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Post by southoftheborder on Sept 13, 2022 17:43:48 GMT -5
I want to say it was Powell River making a run again at BC AAA. Not positive but that rings a bell. Still no team from the Kelowna area either, I’m quite surprised that them and the Van area have never shown interest with their population for players and money in the area. Powell River is the team. I don't think there is any surprise there. I've heard Ft St john may take a swing as well, but that not too sure as they will be in the north peace league. Surprised with Ft. St. John (for this year anyway) as they haven't played at all since early 2019 as they sat out 2019-20 and the NPHL didn't play in either 2020-21 or 2021-22. Kelowna had the Sparta but they withdrew from Allan Cup competition during the 2018-19 season and haven't played since.
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Post by southoftheborder on Sept 13, 2022 6:01:43 GMT -5
Has anyone heard anything from more central regions? Sask and Manitoba? All I have heard so far is the CSHL in Manitoba has expanded for this year and it includes the St Anne Aces among others. Information for most senior leagues start rolling out during the month of September as teams get an idea of how many players they have committed for the season after a number of practice sessions.
It's actually looks like the CSHL might be done as they are down to 2 teams (Grunthal and Steinbach). The SEMHL added Ile-des-Chenes, Red River, and Ste. Anne from the CSHL. Nothing firm from the Tiger Hills or North Central League.
If Steinbach doesn't have a league to play in could the South East Prairie Thunder be back?
Alberta has the Chinook and North Central with posted information for the season. North Peace, Sask/Alta and East Central have not updated yet. North Peace stated it looked like the season would be a go during the summer as they lost last season as well due to restrictions.
BC has the Central Interior league with 8 teams playing this year.
I thought I saw that there might be one or two teams interested in Senior AAA for the year in BC (can't remember the teams but one of them was supposed to be playing Innisfail a few times during the season as a measuring stick to decide whether or not to try).
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