Novice Tournament Takes Over Civic Centre

Another on-ice struggle that sees the puck go to the dominant player.

This past weekend the Wetaskiwin Civic Centre was filled with athletes, coaches and parents as the annual minor hockey novice tournament descended on the city. More than 16 hockey teams and 220 players took part in the tournament Jan. 18 to 20 in Wetaskiwin. Teams travelled from Fort Saskatchewan, Didsbury, Ponoka and Leduc to take part in the three-day tournament in our city.
    Because the Wetaskiwin Minor Hockey Association was able to field a fourth novice team this year, they were able to invite more teams to take part in this year’s tournament, explained novice co-ordinator Lesley Wilson. “Because our registration was up we were able to invite more kids,” she said in an interview with the Pipestone Flyer. “We had 10-to-15 additional kids in the novice division (this year),” she added.
    Wilson said the entire Wetaskiwin Minor Hockey Association board was pleased with the increase in registration this season.“Absolutely,” she said. “Any time the numbers go up its exciting.” The four Wetaskiwin novice teams include the Destroyers, the Vipers, the Titans and the Oilers.
    This year, the Wetaskiwin Minor Hockey Association increased their advertising and had more people signing up after hearing about them through word of mouth, Wilson said.
    “It was a combination of things,” she said about what contributed to the increase in registration this year.
She added that several of the new novice players have never even skated before.

Novice Tournament
    The games for this year’s novice tournament were played Friday night until Sunday morning, with the finals wrapping up Sunday afternoon. In the round-robin play, each team were guaranteed four games before the playoff round.
Besides the action on the ice, the novice teams also held a 50/50 draw and a prize table that guests purchase tickets for.
Wilson said one of the more popular prizes was the junk food hockey bag.
    “It was just a hockey bag we filled with a whole bunch of treats,” she explained. “The kids kept coming up and checking it out.”The money raised from the prize table and 50/50 draw was split between the four novice teams.