It’s business as usual at the Rutland Arena for the Kelowna Chiefs.
Having been eliminated from the Kootenay International Hockey League playoffs in the opening round against the Princeton Posse, Chiefs owner/general manager Jason Tansem has already started planning for the team’s annual spring prospects camp.
Some 80 players ranging in age from 16 to 20 will be invited to the three-day camp, March 29-31.
Planning for next year is positive news for local Chiefs fans, given the rampant discussion in recent weeks about the possibility of the team relocating to the B.C. Interior.
Tansem has maintained there was never any real consideration given to moving the team and is unsure exactly how his Junior ‘A’ team relocating to Williams Lake or Quesnel became a conversational item among the municipal councils of both communities.
Tansem said he offered assistance to businessman Rob McMillan’s bid to bring a KIJHL franchise to the Cariboo, but the relocation of the Chiefs should not have been part of that debate.
He said any movement of other franchises for the 2024-25 season will come up at the next KIJHL owners’ meeting at the end of March.
“For us, it will be business as usual going into next season,” said Tansem, who includes operating the rink concession and skate sharpening/rental businesses at Rutland Arena.
He said assembling a roster for next season, which begins at the spring camp, is one of the fun aspects for him, scouting potential prospects and trying to bring a divergent set of skills and personalities together to form a cohesive team.
“Last year was a good season for us in that we had 15 rookies on our roster. We hope to have a solid nucleus from that group returning for next season but it is one of those things, you are never sure how many players will come back each year,” he said.
“Some players might opt to play elsewhere, some decide to go to university and leave hockey so the turnover is always hard to tell. We usually go into the spring camp thinking we need to fill spots on about half the team.”
Both Tansem and head coach Travers Rebman have sons playing for Brandon and Edmonton respectively in the Western Hockey League, giving them the perspective of both a parent and a coach in building a winning junior hockey organization.
That program entails dealing with travel, schooling and billet demands to ensure a positive on-ice performance level for their players.
“A lot of the kids in our program have higher schooling aspirations and we have a good track record of kids moving on to play hockey at schools here in Canada and the U.S.,” he said.
“We tell the kids who come to our spring camp that the compete level in our league is high, the league is hard, the playoffs are hard and we have to play that way.”
How that process impacts the 2024-25 version of the Chiefs will be evident when the 2024-25 regular season starts in September.
The 2023-24 season for the KIJHL was its first as a Junior A level league, reflective of a changing landscape in junior hockey, Tansem noted.
The BCHL opted to break away from the Hockey Canada hierarchy and go forward as an independent junior league, with five Alberta Junior Hockey League teams opting to migrate to the BCHL.
Meanwhile, ongoing long-time restrictions imposed by the NCAA on sports athletes coming to an end will impact the Western Hockey League, where stipends paid to its players made them ineligible to be awarded scholarships to U.S. university programs.
Tansem said it is anticipated the stipend stipulation will end, creating an opportunity for players to be recruited from the WHL to the NCAA.