The Medicine Hat Cubs logo sits freshly painted at centre ice in the Kinplex on Thursday, Sept. 26, 2019. -- NEWS FILE PHOTO RYAN MCCRACKEN
rmccracken@medicinehatnews.com@MHNMcCracken
The Heritage Junior Hockey League won’t be back until 2021.
The Alberta-based junior B league held a presidents’ meeting last week and decided no competition would be held until January at the earliest, depending on provincial health guidelines.
“The presidents throughout the league pretty much figured there won’t be any hockey the rest of this year,” said Medicine Hat Cubs president Troy Sandau. “We decided to go with a two-week period of practice before we actually get back into games, so it’ll be mid-January if we do see any games. That’s kind of the best-case scenario if things get lifted after Dec. 18.”
With so many moving parts, Sandau says scheduling is still yet to be determined. The league has a number of options, from outright cancelling all games during the shutdown, to shifting the schedule back to the eventual restart date and extending the season further into 2021. Sandau says the HJHL will work to hammer out some of those details at its next presidents’ meeting on Dec. 17.
“That’s yet to be determined. How the schedules work now, I could see us keep rolling with the schedule and the games that are missed are cancelled, maybe we can push it,” said Sandau. “We may not have the info we want from Hockey Alberta and the government by Dec. 17. If things get lifted we can proceed after Dec. 18, but we can’t really see it by the way cases are going, that things will be totally lifted for everybody throughout our league.”
Sandau added a restart will also depend on at least 60 per cent of teams in the league being able to particpate. If that threshold cannot be reached, there will be no HJHL hockey.
“If 60 per cent can’t practice at least, or play, they’ll go across the board with the whole league,” said Sandau.
The Cubs held a 1-1-0 record when COVID directly impacted their season through three positive cases hitting the Coaldale Copperheads in the middle of their series to open the regular season. As a result, the Cubs have been placed on pause since early November.
With any luck, Sandau says provincial restrictions will ease up on Dec. 18 and allow the Cubs to get in a practice or two before breaking again for Christmas.
“It all depends,” he said. “Each team may have a different Christmas break depending on guys from out of town or whatnot, but if things get lifted we may get one or two practices in before the Christmas break.”
