Mitch Calvert
The drive to keep Junior ‘A’ hockey alive in Fort Frances is gaining steam.
A drive to garner 100 season-ticket holders by the end of this week was deemed a success, with 59 paid and more than 100 confirmed for the 2009-10 SIJHL season.
The not-for-profit, community-run effort elected a board of directors last night to oversee operations moving forward.
Milt Strachan Jr. will take the role of president, Jim Fowler was elected as vice-president, and Tara Redford will sit on the board as secretary.
Either Dale Cooper or Everett Freeman ultimately will be tasked with the role of treasurer.
The individual directors who will sit on the board include Don McCool, Larry Patrick, Milt Strachan Sr., Kathy Tucker, Al Loveday, Yvonne Noonan, Wayne Allen, Wade Friesen, and Shirley Dolph.
The team now will run as the Fort Frances Juniors (dropping the Sabres from the title to disassociate themselves from the previous regime) until such time that a replacement name can be decided upon.
A booth will be set up at tomorrow night’s exhibition game against the Sioux Lookout Flyers where people can submit ideas for the new name of the hockey team.
Admission is $5, with the puck dropping at 7:30 p.m.
In related news, the Sabres’ on-ice camp opened Wednesday and continues today with dryland at 4 p.m.
“I was pretty discouraged after [Wednesday] but [yesterday] was a much better effort and we’ll be all right,” head coach Wayne Strachan said at last night’s meeting.
“We have nine forwards who can play at this level, but we’re a little short on defence,” he admitted..
“We’d like to have some local kids fill those spots, but they’ll have to step up their intensity here and get in shape,” Strachan added.
“We have more kids coming in next week, and there are a couple guys [from last year’s team who were traded away in the summer] that have expressed interest in coming back.”
The Juniors are scheduled to open the SIJHL regular season Sept. 17 when the defending champion Fort William North Stars come to town.
