Players hit the ice for SEAC tryouts

By JAMES TUBB on September 11, 2021.

Rosters are starting to form for this season’s SEAC Tigers.

The U15 AAA Tigers concluded their first round of tryouts Thursday night at Co-op Place. This team has not played meaningful games since early 2020 when their season was shut down due to COVID-19. They were able to get three games into the season before shutdowns started.

Coach Tyler Keen said he was just happy to see the guys back on the ice and is excited to see them all getting ready for the season.

“Just seeing these kids compete again. It’s my favourite thing to go to the rink and see them go out there and work together as a team and get better,” said Keen. “Be better hockey players, be better people. I’m hoping we get that opportunity this year.”

The evaluations ran over six nights over a 10-day period. The second round of tryouts is this Saturday and Sunday at the Kinplex and FLC respectively.

For Keen, the first round was exciting to watch and showed a promising team for the 2021-22 season.

“A lot of the returning guys had great summers. Can definitely tell a lot of them made the most of the opportunity last year to work on their skills and get quite a bit better coming into camp,” he said.

A potential COVID shutdown is something Keen has considered, but he says he will leave the big decisions to the “higher ups.” He’s making sure his team follows protocol and is mindful of what they do away from the ice.

“Just telling these kids to be aware of where they are and who they are with. We had situations last year where kids had to miss time because they were close contacts with people. So obviously these kids all they want is to be hockey players, they want to be on the ice,” Keen said.

“Just hoping they can do that and COVID doesn’t affect that part of them.”

The AAA Tigers play their first game Oct. 1 in Medicine Hat against Lethbridge.

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