In theory, it should have taken a few years for the Prairie Hockey Academy to become one of the top teams in the Canadian Sport School Hockey League. After all, isn’t that what expansion teams are supposed to do?
But just like the Las Vegas Golden Knights in their first year in the NHL, neither the Elite 15 nor the Midget Varsity squads wanted anything to do with an excess of ‘Ls’ in the win/loss column.
And boy oh boy did it show on the ice.
The two squads posted impressive results throughout the season, with the Elite 15s putting together a 23-12-0 campaign and reaching the CSSHL championship tournament. The Varsity squad, meanwhile, bested even that remarkable accomplishment, going 15-8-1 and reaching the gold medal game in the CSSHL tournament before just falling short.
Not bad at all for a couple of squads trying to find their way in a new league.
“Having the two teams this season, it’s a full year and we had a lot of fun,” said PHA founder and president Justin Simpkins during the team’s annual awards banquet on Saturday night in Caronport. “We saw a lot of growth and development on and off the ice and the support of the community at today’s banquet is just the icing on the cake.
“We had two teams who were highly competitive this season, one that played in a championship game and I know that the returning players for next year are already talking about that, even with new recruits. That’s their goal, that’s what they’re after. It’s unfinished business so the on-ice side is looking really good.”
The PHA came into existence prior to the 2017-18 season, taking to the ice with an exhibition schedule and a goal of being admitted to the CSSHL at some point. That only took a single season to pull off. The respectability on top of that? Even more impressive.
“That was a pretty big feat,” Simpkins said, adding that he and the team’s coaching staffs – the Elite 15s led by Lorne Molleken and Midget Varsity by Lloyd Friesen – were able to learn a lot themselves about how the league works and will be able to plan accordingly in the future.
Then there’s the off-ice portion of things. The PHA’s goal of developing quality young men in addition to first-rate hockey players appears to be taking hold, as evidenced by talking to the players themselves as well as the hard work they put in in the classroom. In fact, the list of players who received academic honours this year was essentially each team’s roster.
So now it’s on to bigger and better things next season.
“I think the next step is continuing to work on pursuing the academic side at BCA and then for our student-athletes as well, how do we take the next step, how do we do better on ice but also how do we get more involved e in the community?” Simpkins said.
“I’d like to see us run different minor hockey days when we have bye weeks and how do we give back to some of the younger kids who are coming up as well? There’s a lot we can do and want to do in the future.”
