Drumheller had a chance to be a part of the IIHF World Junior Hockey Championship coming up in Alberta this winter.
The main stumbling block - ice time.
The prestigious international tournament will be hosted in Calgary and Edmonton through December and January and features the top international junior hockey talent. Organizers were looking at one of the teams coming to Drumheller for camps leading up to the tournament, but with a single ice sheet in the valley, the community was not able to accommodate it.
“Drumheller was a group we talked to about hosting a World Junior Training Camp,” said Kevin Webster, manager of event operations for Hockey Canada. “It was a decision they had to make locally based on their groups and we totally understand that. It is not easy in some of these communities getting the ice time they need with their current groups.”
He said one international teams could have used Drumheller as a site for its preparation camp.
He said this is a model they often use, and it is valuable to the participating communities.
“It is great. They (communities) wouldn’t normally have a team like that touch down in their communities. We did it in Saskatchewan and Ottawa and those communities really bought in to housing the teams for a bit,” he said.
“It is good for the team, the community gets behind them, and there is a little bit of fanfare before they head off before the event.”
He also indicated there is an economic impact for the communities that participate.
Webster said they worked with the Drumheller Dragons on the possibility.
“They were great to work with. In the end it wasn’t that they didn’t want to do it, it just didn’t happen,” said Webster.
Brooke Christianson of the Drumheller Dragons sees the World Juniors as a lost opportunity.
“I don’t think it’s a secret that prime ice time in Drumheller is hard to come by, the saddest part of it and the part that I think some people don’t realize is that because of that, Drumheller is not considered as a possibility for large tournaments or events like this that would bring many dollars into our town and this is a missed opportunity for Drumheller,” said Christianson. “Our staff were all very excited about hosting the world junior camp. I think about how excited all of the kids would have been to meet the players and see this level of hockey played right here in town. I remember when I was a kid and the world juniors came to Hanna for an exhibition game, at that age, it seemed like the biggest thing that ever happened, it was awesome.”
Webster said Hockey Canada would be announcing shortly where the team camps and exhibition games will be located during the tournament.
