The male U18 Pembina Valley Hawks are set to kick off a new season, and it always comes with at least some degree of optimism.
“I’m really looking forward to getting things going here,” coach Jeff Andrews said after a week of mixed results in pre-season action.
Those games included a 3-0 loss to Brandon, a 9-3 win over Yellowhead, and a 7-3 loss to Yorkton, but the results are secondary at this point.
“I wasn’t super concerned about wins and losses. It was more about giving the kids an opportunity to show us what type of players they are and how they might fit in our group,” said Andrews.
The Hawks finished in sixth place last season with a record of 23-17-5-3, but they bowed out of the playoffs in falling to the Winnipeg Bruins in the quarter-finals.
Andrews sees potential with their roster this year with five returning forwards and three returning defencemen along with one more possibly coming back, but they have no returning goaltenders.
“It’s going to be a fairly new look group, but we’re really excited about the group that we have,” he said. “I think we have an interesting group because I think we can score, and I think we’re going to be able to defend well. We should have good team speed, and we’ve got a couple goaltenders that I think are going to be able to do a great job for us.”
Andrews noted their new players are usually coming to the team with strong experience from the U15 level.
“They’ve played good triple A level hockey,” he said, suggesting there are a few key things the Hawks coaching staff are looking for from the players. “Attention to detail is going to be really important for us. We’re going to teach them a lot of structure, and our ability to play structured hockey is going to be important for us. I’m a big believer in structured hockey leading to less goals against. The lower number of goals you give up, the better chance you have to win games.
“It’s also the willingness to always come to the rink and do your best … and I think another big part of it is trying to create a winning culture and be great teammates.”
The Hawks have a couple more exhibition games this weekend against Parkland before starting the regular season with a home game against Norman on Sept. 26.
