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The 2010/2011 Manitoba Junior Hockey League season has been underway for about two weeks now and things so far have been pretty exciting. The Flyers are in first place in the Addison Division right now for a number of reasons, none of which I want to get into right now for no other reason than because I don’t want to jinx them.
You look at the standings as of right now and there are some teams in some places that nobody really expected. On any given night anybody can beat anybody and I think that is a really good thing.
Last season the Dauphin Kings hosted the RBC Cup and therefore had a guaranteed ticket into the national championship. Because of that they had absolutely no trouble recruiting top level talent to their hockey club. As a result they were head and shoulders above the rest of the league and made for a bit of an unlevel playing field. I am not saying that is anyone’s fault but if your team was playing against the Kings of 2009/2010 you were pretty sure a win wasn’t in the cards. They are now 4-4-1 to start the year and the OCN Blizzard, who didn’t even make the playoffs last season are 6-0. Who would have thought that hey!
Anyway, to get to my point I want to talk about the shuffle in the league this year and about the exciting parody that there seems to be. Like I said before, any team this season is capable of winning any game. From the top to the bottom there is a lot of talent in this league. Even the teams that are in the bottom of their respective divisions are good, young teams.
I think this does wonders for the league in terms of growing the support in certain towns that may not be used to having competitive teams. It goes a long way to attracting and retaining quality player from both Manitoba and other places. It also makes a much more desirable brand of hockey to spend you more to go and watch.
Having an overall competitive league makes for a more excitement and a higher level of hockey. It sure beats the heck out of a league where you can basically print out a league schedule before the season even starts and be able to pencil in who is going to win and by how many. That is no fun and drops the caring level for a lot of people.
I love going to the league site after the games are over and being able to say “Oh man, so and so beat so and so. That is cool!”.
I think we will see this become more and more evident as we move along here during the season. There will always been those teams (Winkler I hope) that separate themselves but if the younger teams are able to keep improving and becoming more competitive that will be a good thing.
There are a number of other blog topics that I have in mind and if you have any then please let me know. Thanks for checking out “Behind the Mic” and please let me know what you think of the blog or this years team or whatever.....see you around!
You look at the standings as of right now and there are some teams in some places that nobody really expected. On any given night anybody can beat anybody and I think that is a really good thing.
Last season the Dauphin Kings hosted the RBC Cup and therefore had a guaranteed ticket into the national championship. Because of that they had absolutely no trouble recruiting top level talent to their hockey club. As a result they were head and shoulders above the rest of the league and made for a bit of an unlevel playing field. I am not saying that is anyone’s fault but if your team was playing against the Kings of 2009/2010 you were pretty sure a win wasn’t in the cards. They are now 4-4-1 to start the year and the OCN Blizzard, who didn’t even make the playoffs last season are 6-0. Who would have thought that hey!
Anyway, to get to my point I want to talk about the shuffle in the league this year and about the exciting parody that there seems to be. Like I said before, any team this season is capable of winning any game. From the top to the bottom there is a lot of talent in this league. Even the teams that are in the bottom of their respective divisions are good, young teams.
I think this does wonders for the league in terms of growing the support in certain towns that may not be used to having competitive teams. It goes a long way to attracting and retaining quality player from both Manitoba and other places. It also makes a much more desirable brand of hockey to spend you more to go and watch.
Having an overall competitive league makes for a more excitement and a higher level of hockey. It sure beats the heck out of a league where you can basically print out a league schedule before the season even starts and be able to pencil in who is going to win and by how many. That is no fun and drops the caring level for a lot of people.
I love going to the league site after the games are over and being able to say “Oh man, so and so beat so and so. That is cool!”.
I think we will see this become more and more evident as we move along here during the season. There will always been those teams (Winkler I hope) that separate themselves but if the younger teams are able to keep improving and becoming more competitive that will be a good thing.
There are a number of other blog topics that I have in mind and if you have any then please let me know. Thanks for checking out “Behind the Mic” and please let me know what you think of the blog or this years team or whatever.....see you around!
After listening to how mad the coach was after last night's loss to Neepawa, I hope he backs up what he says. Too many coaches provide lip service but have no follow through; which leads to no positive results. I think some players would be well served to watch a game from the stands or on the pine.
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