POTENTIALLY FATAL BLOW DEALT TO HOCKEY IN SASK
By: Jamie Neugebauer
Voice of the ND Hounds
If the 2020-2021 Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League campaign wasn’t in palliative care before, it certainly is now.
A Jan. 14 memorandum from the Saskatchewan Hockey Association to its membership outlined that there would be “no consideration of return to play (games) for at least four (4) weeks and that a return to game play is unlikely to happen before the end of March.”
The SHA was dictated to Jan. 13 over zoom, along with all of our province’s sport governing bodies, by Premier Moe’s Governmental Business Response Team headed up by Ken Dueck.
Language in the document suggested SHA boss Kelly McClintock and company did not see this coming, even in light of Dr. Shahab and the Saskatchewan Health Authority’s move to extend its Public Health Order until Jan. 29 Tuesday.
“This certainly was not the news that the SHA, nor all other winter sports was expecting,” the memorandum reads.
“With the current rate of positive cases per 100,000 people placing Saskatchewan near the top in Canada, the likelihood of things changing before the end of March is looking bleak.”
The frustration at the news is not helped by the fact that even in the nearby states in the USA, junior games are getting upwards of 1,500 fans allowed in the arena.
Find the full memorandum here: https://sha.sk.ca/news/archives/return-to-play-update-jan-14-2021
Jamie, I’ll comment more on your columns. They are very good. Hang in there. “This certainly was not the news that the SHA, nor all other winter sports was expecting,” I would put forward why was this not expected? Since this began – SHA who deflects to Hockey Canada and the SJHL which defers to not sure who they defer to this is on their hands. They cost these kids the season from Junior through to Novice. Hockey falls under the guise of health and fitness. When the gyms closed, the gym owners banded together, and presented their case to… Read more »
As the manager of one of the provinces Curling Clubs, this was not the news we were expecting at all!