Muskie hockey teams wrap up tryouts

Both Muskie hockey teams have wrapped up tryouts and now are in practice mode preparing for their first games of the NorWOSSA season.
The boys’ team will see its first action when they host a Nov. 2-4 exhibition tournament while the girls’ squad will host an eight-team tournament Oct. 26-28.
Boys’ head coach Shane Bliss was pleased with how his week-and-a-half of drills and scrimmages went.
“I think it went pretty well, actually,” he said. “I’m always overwhelmed by how many kids sign up.”
About 75 boys tried out for the team, including “quality kids we can’t fit onto our roster,” Bliss said.
Girls’ coach Chris Hill, meanwhile, said it was much the same on his end.
“The one thing I have come to like about the tryouts is since my time I’ve been involved in the team, more and more girls come out,” he noted. “I’m actually excited.
“The last few years have been kind of exciting because we’ve achieved more during [the past] year, but this team this year is pretty much the same core team returning,” he added.
Hill said the key to this team will be managing a group familiar with the coaches and each other, “hopefully one year older, one year stronger.”
Bliss, however, said that also can be a challenge for coaches.
“Last year we had a pretty young team, but I think they over-exceeded my expectations,” he noted. “This year, we’ve got most of them back.
“Every year you’ve always got to look at the team you’ve got . . . when you’ve got 85 percent of your team returning, you’ve gotta change things up in practice to keep them going,” Bliss reasoned.
While both teams are sporting veteran lineups, both coaches said a number of Grade 9s and some Grade 10s forced the senior members of the teams to play at their best during the tryouts.
Bliss insisted there were no free passes handed out to anyone with the team. “They have to show me that they want to be here, they want to be a Muskie,” he stressed.
The boys will face a schedule that Bliss said is “pretty solid,” with fewer league games—12 instead of 18—but with a number of additional exhibition matches to cover the difference.
The girls will see a different calendar, too, with an increased number of games against American high schools “to kind of switch up the competition,” Hill said.
While the girls’ first on-ice action will be in their eight-team tournament here in late October against NorWOSSA rivals like the Kenora and Dryden, their first league game is a bit further away—a home game Nov. 13 against the Eagles.
The boys likewise host a tournament—the ‘AAA’ team from Shattock, Mn. is the only competitor currently confirmed—before they begin their season in Red Lake on Nov. 16.
Hill said their tournament will allow the girls to “just get a good start to the season.”
“I think we’ve got a good mix this year,” he added. “A lot of the things I’ve found to be the most successful—yeah, you’ve got skill, but if you can’t get along in the change room, you can’t get along on the ice.”
This year, the chemistry is the best he’s seen from the girls. “Everyone’s best friends,” Hill said.