Decompress...Crossover... it will be fun

The KIJHL Governors had a meeting last weekend where they disscussed several different things including marketing ideas and scheduling that will get finalized at the KIJHL AGM in June so are not out to the public yet.

However, there was some news coming out of the meeting that KIJHL Vice President Phil Iddon was able to talk about and that was a bit on scheduling. You may remember the that there were some complaints from Kimberley about how many playoff and total games the Nitro's had to play compared to the other teams from the PIJHL and the VIJHL. Kimberley played 4 playoff rounds and 26 games in 46 days while Campbell River played 3 playoff rounds and 17 games in 59 days. Taylor Rocca's story is here  

Overall in the KIJHL we play more games, the VIJHL (Campbell River Storm) play a 48 game schedule and the PIJHL who hosted the Cyclone Taylor Cup a few weeks ago, play a 44 game schedule.  The KIJHL Governors like their longer 52 game schedule that keeps them closer to a Jr "A" schedule in length but they don't like all the 3 games in 3 days weekends and some of the weekday games. So with that in mind they have decided to start the season a week earlier and end a week later to try and decompress the schedule a bit. The actual dates will be finalized at the AGM.

Also the Cyclone Taylor Cup will be moved back a few days and will start April 7-11 this year. That along with the KIJHL Final going down to a best of 5 should make it easier on the Championship winning team to get a bit of rest before they start the Cyclone Tournament.

The KIJHL also agreed to keep the "Crossovers", which means fans will see teams from both conferences every year. So fans in say, the Eddie Mountain Division, will see teams from the Okanagan Division one year and the Doug Birks Division the next. Just like it has been for the last several seasons.

Thoughts
Ultra happy were keeping the "Crossovers" you always want to see how good the other Divisions are so you know how good you will have to be to win everything. 

The best of 5 final... VP Iddon says the logic is that it will shorten the P/O schedule a bit and cut down on the potential huge travel costs... and it will only affect 2 teams vs a best of 5 in the first round featuring 16 teams.

 I can live with the 52 games if there is a way to cut down the 3 games in 3 days fiasco we see every year. The 3 in 3 is too much IMO. I'm not sure how compressed the playoff schedule will be, but it was not very good this year... after the AGM we should have a better idea.

Starting the playoffs mid week is another disaster we had for years, you fight hard for first place then get penalized with no home games on the weekend, and that was a "Travesty" ...the fix for that is a Thursday start so you get a Friday game and the other team gets at least a Sunday game.


Nice work KIJHL you worked out a few things for the betterment of the league and fans.