As reported in last week’s Mercury, with only two rinks in town, the Estevan Strippers are moving their tournament to have a few games in Bienfait this year.
With the Civic Auditorium on its way to the being decommissioned, the Estevan Strippers have had to move their Late March/early April tournament to be played in the Power Dodge Ice Centre, Affinity Place, and now the Bienfait arena.
“The other issue we run into at this time of year, and we hope we do run into it this year is that we could be down to one rink for one day at least, if the Bruisn continue to win in the playoffs,” said Rohatyn. “They have to get access with their building also, so we could have issues with having that building and hopefully we do, because we like to see them continue on in the playoffs.”
The organization has a tentative schedule that shows games in Bienfait but have to talk to the teams and make sure they’re ok with it.
Other rural rinks have had to deal with a power demand charge at the beginning of every month, Rohatyn said. “They’re assessed a power fee and we don’t know what that is. We have to wait to see the Beinfait rink board has a meeting to give us a figure that we can work with. We do know that their per hour ice charge will be less than what we’ll pay in Estevan so we can make up some of that money by having to pay less per hour…
“The Strippers have had a good relationship with Bienfait because we’ve donated to their rink in the past when they needed repairs. And we think it’ll be the least disruptive to our tournament at this time.”
There will be 40 teams invited again this year, plus others on a waiting list. Rohatyn said it would be difficult to contact teams and tell them they couldn’t come.
“The best option was to go to Bienfait this year,” he said.
The team will be tackling this a year at a time, and Rohatyn is hopeful teams won’t have to travel for more than one game.
