In 1903 the first skating rink was established in Carlyle. Soon a friendly rivalry was developed with the nearby town of Arcola as games would be played in each town. By the winter of 1905-06 scheduled games between Carlyle, Arcola, and Reston, MB, were being held. Thus, the rich hockey culture surrounding Carlyle can be traced back over a century.
The Carlyle senior men's hockey team had been involved with the Triangle League, which had teams from more northern towns in southeast Saskatchewan and a year after the fledgling Big Six League was established in 1959 Carlyle decided to switch leagues. With a change in league came a new logo and team name, which resulted in the Carlyle Cougars through a "name the team" contest according to the Carlyle history book, "Prairie Trails to Blacktop."
The 1960s turned into building years for the team who had found great competition in the Big Six, but by 1966 they would earn the championship.
In 1978 the senior team dropped out of the Big Six and moved to join the Interprovincial League with a junior Carlyle Cougars team, while the senior members would disperse, mostly joining with Arcola to form the Moose Mountain Combines. This was short lived and the senior team was re-established in the winter of 1979-80.
This gave rise to tough competition and more losses than wins for the team, but hockey remained ever popular with a full roster each year and many fans continually coming out to the games to show their support.
This support and the hard work of the Cougars resulted in a 1988/89 win for the Cougars as they won the Big Six championship for the first time in 20 years. Boyd Cochrane was the coach that year and would stick around until the 1991 season, when RCMP Staff Sgt. George Francis would take over.
The fans continued to come out and in 1993 during the seven game series against the Carnduff Red Devils lost the final game. Though disappointing, the Cougars managed to host a record number of fans in the stands cheering for both teams at 1,289, a submission to the new history book "From Blacktop to Black Gold," which will be printed soon, explains.
Now the 2013/14 season has brought with it no senior men's hockey to the town of Carlyle. For the first time since their break in 1978 to create a junior Cougars team, Carlyle is missing its senior hockey.
Though those associated with the team hope that a year off is all they need to spark interest, there are concerns that the hockey team won't be able to ice one next year either.
This loss was seen in other small towns such as Kipling, where the Big Six League President, Emile Balogh, lives.
"It's a big part of the community and to lose your senior hockey team is difficult," Balogh stated. "We lost ours for about 10 years and we were just lucky to have strong minor hockey until it started up again otherwise I don't know if the rink would have been able to open."
Small towns find themselves far away from much of the entertainment city dwellers are able to partake in, which is why during winter when it is cold and dreary hockey can bring a community together.
Though the area is busy and there are many people who are eligible to play the team ran into issues last year when the end of the season came around and the team only had about eight guys willing to play.
"Last year we finished with, I think, eight guys and in order to have a team to compete in that league you need at least 15 guys every night," Clayton Geiger, one of last season's players explained.
"We always had a full squad, but last year we had a few guys we didn't know were going to quit, quit, and others had some work problems."
This year as the men attempted to ice a team, they quickly realized there was not enough interest and though they wanted to put a team out there it was not realizable.
"Our numbers heading in were nowhere near 15, so we had to take a year of absence," Geiger explained.
Heading into the current season, the Cougars would have again had eight dedicated players; not only would this mean they couldn't be as competitive as the other teams, but there was the big question of goaltending and if they would be able to find anyone.
In addition to the question of where they would find players, those attempting to put the team together this season were concerned with management as well.
" we have no executive left which didn't help things, so it was kind of the players running it the last few years, which makes it too tough for the guys to kind of play and look after the executive part of it," Geiger stated.
In the end they were not able to make the senior men's team a reality this year, which was disappointing to many in the community who enjoy fast-paced, intense hockey.
Everyone does hope that the Cougars will only need the one year off to re-organize and hopefully find new players to bring into the team as senior men's hockey has been popular in Carlyle since the beginning, 1903, when Carlyle and Arcola competed against each other.
