It was an unceremonious end to the Drumheller Dragons hockey season on Wednesday, April 28, when the AJHL announced the final schedule for the 2020-2021 season, and the Dragons weren’t on it.
The AJHL announced its final cohort pairings for the season. The Dragons were not on the schedule. This follows the cancellation of their April 24 and 25 games versus the Okotoks Oilers, after a positive COVID-19 result was identified in the Dragons’ Cohort.
“We kind of exhausted all options and persevered through as much as we could. But I think kind of what was happening throughout the league, the writing was kind of on the wall, and it was time to align ourselves with the ending of other leagues, the western league mainly,” said Dragons coach Kevin Hasselberg.
He said this year there would not be any playoffs, nor will the league award a championship.
“The point and goal of playing these games was to ensure players had the opportunity to showcase their skills and character to potentially earn an opportunity to play at the next level and give the opportunity to these kids to play and compete and maintain some normalcy in the COVID world,” said Hasselberg.
The Dragons completed the latest round of games with a 5-5 record, the fourth-best in the Viterra AJHL South division.
“It’s been great, we’re really thankful, but it is time to call it,” said Hasselberg.
“We can’t wait to get fans back into the rink so we can play the game the way it was meant to be played.”
