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WHL Christmas Schedule Questions?

Gregg Drinnan, TAKING NOTE, Jan 2 2012

Prince George head coach Dean Clark met up with Gerard Hayes, one of the WHL’s officiating supervisors, moments after the Cougars had dropped a 5-0 decision to the host Kamloops Blazers on Sunday night.

“That’s embarrassing . . . that’s embarrassing,” Clark told Hayes.

Clark was referring to the officiating. He may as well have been referring to the entertainment value of the game.

The time has come for the WHL to take a serious look at its schedule in the latter half of December and into January.

This season, the WHL played games through Dec. 18 and then broke for Christmas, returning with games on Dec. 27.

The WHL boasts of having 34 of its players competing at the U-17 World Hockey Challenge. And in another news release it tells us that there are 18 more of its players in the World Junior Championship.

That means the WHL’s 22 teams are missing 52 of their better players. And that doesn’t include any players who are out with injuries.

With 22 teams, the WHL’s talent pool is thin enough — some would say it’s thinner than the gruel Tiny Tim would get for breakfast — that none of its teams has the depth to withstand losing players to these Christmas assignments without it having a real impact.

On Sunday in Kamloops, for example, the two teams were missing seven players who are competing in the WJC and/or WHC. Four others were out with injuries.

While the Blazers are second in the 10-team Western Conference, the Cougars are scrambling to get into the playoffs. Down five players, they just didn’t have the depth to compete with the Blazers.

The result was a game that was anything but entertaining. As entertainment, it was . . . well, it wasn’t. (Oh, we should tell you that the same two teams get to do it again Friday and Saturday in Prince George. Hopefully, help will have arrived by then.)

Despite missing all those players, of course, the WHL and its teams aren’t about to give the fans a break by cutting ticket prices.

So why not change the schedule?

Why not play games through Dec. 22 or Dec. 23 and then break until early in the new year?

Why not allow players to go home and spend some real quality Christmas time with their families, instead of having to travel on Boxing Day (Dec. 26) in order to play games on Dec. 27?

Why not extend the break right into the new year? The WHC and WJC wrap up on Jan. 4 and Jan. 5, so why not give the teams and their fans a break and return on Jan. 6 or 7?

This season, the WHL schedule was dark for eight days. Why not play through Dec. 23, bring players back Jan. 2 for a couple days of practice and then resume the schedule? Why not take two weeks off instead of eight days?

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
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