A not so friendly Hockey Canada reminder

This comes out every year at this time and should be nothing new. Last season it caught a KIJHL  player , don't let it happen to you.

BC HOCKEY BULLETIN
Hockey Canada, its member Branches, Major Junior and registered Junior Hockey Leagues in Canada are concerned with the proliferation of leagues that operate outside the auspices of Hockey Canada.
Hockey Canada offers the best development programs worldwide. It has invested significant resources in the development of officials, coaches, administrators and players countrywide. We have a committed strategy toward a cohesive long term athlete development model.
These non-member organizations do not support the development of these programs. Further, they operate in a vacuum, with no consideration to the impact of their programs on minor, junior, senior, adult recreational hockey, female hockey, officiating development, coaching development or administrator development in Canada. These non-member leagues instead choose to utilize the resources already developed by Hockey Canada and its member Branches. The teams who make up these "leagues" operate in this fashion because they do not agree with the existing overall vision of Hockey Canada. They profess to have a better program yet often operate without a constitution, by- laws, create their own rule book and may not provide adequate insurance for their participants. Further, they offer the lure of "Rep" or "Junior" level competition when this is clearly not the case.
Hockey Canada, its member Branches, Major Junior Leagues as well as registered Junior Hockey Leagues wish to be exceedingly clear with our response to these programs.
Definition:
Hockey Canada and its member Branches view all leagues that operate outside the auspices/sanctioning of Hockey Canada programs to be classified as non-member leagues. This currently does not include summer hockey leagues/teams, adult recreational hockey leagues/teams, high school hockey, and/or hockey schools.
Sanctions

1. 1)  Any individual who participates (knowingly or otherwise) in non-member programs after September 30 of the season in question ("the Cut-Off Date") will lose all membership privileges with Hockey Canada for the remainder of that season, and may only reapply for membership with Hockey Canada after the end of that season. "Participation" in an non-member program will be considered to have occurred if the individual takes part in one game (including an exhibition, tournament, league or playoff game) after the Cut-Off Date.
   If a participant makes the choice to participate in these non-member programs, they must understand the ramifications of that choice and that the sanctions described in this paragraph will remain in effect even if the league or team folds, or the individual is released, suspended or fired.
   
2. 2)  Hockey Canada and its member Branches across the country will make every effort to ensure that local minor hockey and female hockey associations in areas where non-member leagues exist are not supporting these leagues in any manner whatsoever. For greater certainty, "supporting" includes, but is not limited to, assisting an non-member league directly or indirectly through
   

advertisement, promotion, ticket sales, volunteer activities, assigning Officials, sharing resources or enabling such a league to participate in Hockey Canada sanctioned activities. We will withhold tournament sanctions and will preclude such associations from benefitting from any Hockey Canada/Branch/CHL sanctioned event by whatever means necessary, including the withdrawal of any such event from any community within the geographic boundaries of that association if need be to stress this point.
This policy is aimed at those leagues that choose to operate outside the hockey structure established by Hockey Canada, its member Branches and the Canadian Hockey League.

The KIJHL AGM Hi Lites

Fifth year Fernie Ghostrider President Barb Anderson and Head Coach and GM Craig Mohr went to Kamloops June 9-10-11 for the KIJHL AGM. Here are a few of the hi lights of that meeting that fans should be interested in.

First of all we will have a 47 game schedule and there will be no crossovers again this year, meaning that we will not see any teams from the  Okanagan. This will be the second season of a cost saving experiment that worked for most teams but not for all. 

I hate not seeing teams like Osoyoos and Summerland but I like the 47 vs 52 game schedule. I believe the volunteers get  burned out by game 40 or so… but get rejuvenated when the playoffs start. I'm bettin on 52 games in 2018-19 though.

The KIJHL and the other two junior B leagues in BC have opted out of the Keystone Cup for various reasons but travel costs are number 1. Personally after the Cyclone Taylor Cup I could care less about the Keystone and their two games a day tournament. Anyway if you want to know more Read Beaver Valley’s $50,000 something account of their trip to the  Keystone by clicking here... it's not pretty 

The KIJHL’s Bill Ohlhausen is back for his 16th year as President… a sometimes thankless job that occasionally sees him take a beating from some of the GM’s and Governors whenever team discipline is handed out. They actually should thank him...

The KIJHL will also go back to a 7 game vs 5 game semi and final series’. Seems more traditional to me but the 5 games was not the end of the world IMO.

The league will shutdown in mid January for the Prospects Game. Last year was a trial for the PG so the schedulers fit it in but several teams had to play games with out their top prospects creating howls of protest in the background. But it all worked out for the better and it’s a go for this season. 

Going full face protection was talked about but rejected. See the previous post...someday it will get mandated. 

There is still interest from Quesnell and Williams Lake to join the KIJHL. It will happen sooner than later if you ask me and two powerful franchises will be created. Too bad with no crossovers we will never see them. I only hope teams move there vs expansion.

And finally, some Governors have been saying that it's looking like all the teams in the league are starting to get on the same page... this can only mean good things  for the fans.

Full Face Shields

According to this story 112 junior teams in Ontario will be wearing full cages this year.

The subject was been brought up here in the KIJHL before but the teams were not interested in going full face protection. Most of the hockey guys I know agree that with full cages the elbows, sticks, and hands go up and maybe player respect takes a hit as well.

There is evidence out there showing that  face injuries and dental claims go way down with full face masks. Also,  player insurance costs also go down as well, and as one coach told me, way down.

So far the junior leagues out west have not had to wear full cages, and if you polled the different league's governors and coaches they would vote no by a large margin ... but I'm betting that in the next couple of years there will be no voting, it will be mandated by either BC Hockey or Hockey Canada who, if you didn't know, provide the insurance for all carded players . So bank on it, cause for insurance reasons HC & BCAHA's gonna be banking on it as well and like it or not, no fighting and full cages is the way it's headed .

And finally, if a team wanted to they could tell their players, if you want to play here, you have to wear a full face shield.  And that would be interesting, like a science experiment. 

Some coaches think they would have a  hard time getting players, and that's likely... but maybe not, the team may actually get a recruiting advantage. Some (lots of ?) parents might want to send little Johnny to cageville, after all, average Johnny ain't goin to the NHL anyway, so why get hurt. And some players may actually want to keep the cage on.