With the end of their regular season for Yorkton Minor Hockey (YMH), Ryan Hoffman, Jeff Sperling and Jeff Ronn, coaches with YMH pulled together 15 young players, nine from Yorkton and six more from Moosomin, Esterhazy, Canora and Regina. The new team, the Source 05s, sponsored by Source Embroidery, took top the ice for practices in March. Following four weeks of weekend practises the Source 05s travelled to Calgary for a hockey tournament, Hoffman reports.
Coaches started with a core group of Yorkton youngsters. In January they hosted a tryout skate, inviting participation from youngsters within a couple of hours of Yorkton. A handful of youngsters were selected from that skate to complete the roster, Hoffman explains.
The young local hockey stars had a great time in Calgary, Hoffman reports. The team played six games in total. They had a 3-1 record in the round robin before advancing to the second vs third place game to see who would advance to the final. The youngsters won the semi-final game before falling to Calgary in the tournament final.
Coaches put the team together to extend the season by a month for the youngsters before they turned their attention to ball and soccer. "It allowed some of the kids to play together for an extra month, to play with a few different kids and have a good experience," Hoffman says.
The weekend in Calgary was busy with six games in three days. Every game was a 20 minute stop time game which is about twice as long as what the young players were accustomed to back home. "They were worn out and played out at the end of the day but they had a lot of fun," Hoffman claims.
Plans are in place to repeat the spring hockey next year. Hoffman suggests the process might be started a little earlier next year and perhaps be a little better organized. He says there's a good strong core of kids around that age in Yorkton and he and fellow coaches would like to continue to build on that.
