By Derek Cornet

La Ronge athletes headed to elite AAA hockey tournament in Calgary

Dec 14, 2018 | 11:00 AM

It will be a unique experience for three local athletes who will be competing in the Mac’s AAA Midget World Invitational Hockey Tournament later this month in Calgary.

As members of the Saskatchewan Midget AAA Hockey League’s Beardy’s Blackhawks team, forwards Cobe Delaney and Chase Vancoughnett-Lafleur, as well as defenceman Parker Layton, will participate in the elite tournament. According to Beardy’s Head Coach Dale Grayston, the championship is difficult to be invited to as only the top teams are asked to go. The last time his team was invited was in 2011.

“It’s the best of the best in mostly western Canada,” Grayston said. “Normally in our league they accept the top five teams by the middle of November. We just narrowly missed out on that, but they had one team cancel out and they sent a special invitation to our team to take part this year.”

In all, 25 teams will compete in the tournament starting Dec. 26 with five teams in five pools. Out of those 25 teams, only eight will advance to the playoffs which will begin New Year’s Eve. Grayston said the final game will take place Jan. 1, 2019, at the Scotiabank Saddledome. As the tournament is highly competitive and has attracted teams from the Russia, Switzerland and the United States in previous years, he said it’s not often a squad from Saskatchewan wins the title. In 2017, the championship was won by the Regina Pat Canadians who won 4-0 over the Red Deer Optimist Chiefs.

As for Delaney, Layton and Vancoughnett-Lafleur, who are on the Beardy’s Blackhawks for this first time this year, Grayston said they’ve been terrific athletes to work with. He added those players have worked hard to earn their spot on the team.

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“The neat thing about the three of them is when we came into camp this year, we had spots open on the team and we really had no idea who was going to grab them,” he said. “That’s one of the things I admire about those three is they came in without any hype about them, they worked hard and found a way to make our team.”

derek.cornet@jpbg.ca

Twitter: @saskjourno