The team is on their way to Trail, with a stop over in Grand Forks, for this weekend’s annual Trail Tournament. The Kings will square off against the NAHL’s Wenatchee Wild, the AJHL’s Brooks Bandits and the BCHL’s Trail Smoke Eaters. Here’s a brief rundown of all the Kings opponents this weekend.
Thursday at 3:00pm – vs Wenatchee Wild
I had a chance to visit Wenatchee while I was with the Prince George Fury indoor soccer team, and I was blown away by just how beautiful of a place it is. It reminds me a lot of the Okanagan, but more trees. The Wild joined the NAHL as an expansion team in 2008, and I’ve heard some rumblings that they would like to move to the BCHL…don’t know if that’s true or not. They won the Western Division in their first two years of existance, and finishing 2nd this past season.
The team has lost a lot of its scoring from last season, however Ben Carey remains, and he scored 43 points in 57 games for the Wild last year.
Friday at 7:00pm – vs Trail Smoke Eaters
Trail has lost their top 6 scorers from last year, so addition of offense will be crutial for them this season. The Kings will get a first look at the Trail offense this weekend. Erik Cooper, 32 points from 59 games, returns for the team as one of the elder statesmen and will hopefully be able to produce some points for the team. Lots of unanswered questions our of camp for the Smokies, but Trail has a long track record for producing talented teams, so I have no question that this year will be no different.
This game also serves as a preview to the October 29th contest between the two sides, in the one and only meeting this season. That game is at the Hap at a 7:30 start.
Saturday at 10:00am – vs Brooks Bandits
The Bandits have been a perennial playoff performer in the AJHL the past 7 years, but haven’t managed to make it to the league final. They won their division in 2008/2009, but aside from that, they haven’t been able to make that next step.
Riley Simpson and Matt Wilkins provided the scoring last season, finishing 3rd and 2nd in league scoring respectively…both are gone. The positive is Jan Obernesser, their goaltender, who went 31-10-4 last year, which was the 3rd highest number of wins in the league.
So there is a little preview on each of the teams in the tournament. Again, follow the blog all weekend as we’ll get some info up after each game, otherwise I encourage you to follow Chris Wahl, voice of the Smokes, via twitter (@wahlsy) for updates all weekend.
