Great North finals begin
North Bay Trappers will begin their best-of-five Great North Midget Hockey League championship series against the Sudbury Nickel Capital Wolves with a pair of home games at Memorial Gardens.
The series begins tonight with a 7:00 match. Game 2 is set for Sunday night at 6:30.
North Bay, which finished in first place during the regular season despite having a rookie-laden lineup of players with 2001 birth dates, upended the fourth-seeded Kapuskasing Flyers 3-2 in their semi-final series.
Second-place finishers during the regular season, veteran-laden Sudbury — with an abundance of 1999 and 2000 birth-year players in its lineup — cuffed the third-seeded Soo Greyhounds 3-1 in their semi-final set.
Was it a matter of choice that the Trappers went with mostly rookies ? Where’s all the 1999″ ers ? High school hockey is strong in the Bay …….but wondering if they chose to build around the 2001 .
The Sault’s major midget coach should take notes. Imagine that ….a midget team (North Bay) that is all about 2001 player development and projecting them to the next level. Kudos to North Bay, their hockey program actually gets it.
I believe the Sudbury team wanted to sign minor midgets this year but were told they were not allowed to. Feel bad for the kids that were forced to play for a bad coached hockey team all season. Think of how well the North Bay and Sault players, especially Baber benefited from playing with older players ie; theriault. I agree gordie, the best minor midget aged players should be playing with the major club, especially in the north since we don’t have the numbers. Doesn’t mean you cant have a minor midget team in Sudbury or elsewhere but these teams would be more of a development and give extra players a chance to play AAA in hopes of making the major team the following year. I guess in that situation they wont have the top end minor players but they cant do much worse than last season with the best players.