By Mitch Bach

Hockey Alberta to merge Lethbridge, Medicine Hat elite hockey zones

Apr 11, 2017 | 11:55 AM

MEDICINE HAT, AB — Hockey Alberta has announced it will be merging elite hockey teams in Medicine Hat and Lethbridge.

In a news release sent on Monday, the organization announced it will merge the Southeast Athletic Club and Lethbridge Minor Hockey into a new south zone to draw talent from. 

According to the release, Hockey Alberta has been analyzing registration statistics in each elite draw zone, and found Medicine Hat and Lethbridge had a significantly smaller number of registered players.

The South Zone will be split into East and West zones, and contain a total of five teams. There will be two bantam AAA teams, two midget 15 teams and one midget AAA teams. Kris Schultz, GM for Medicine Hat Minor Hockey Association, says Medicine Hat will still have a midget 15 team and a bantam AAA team, but the midget AAA team will draw from the brand new south zone.

“At this point, the team is carded and registered under Lethbridge Minor Hockey,” he said, adding that at this point, a coach has been named already named.

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“Our 16 and 17 year old kids who want to play Triple-A midget will be travelling and trying out in Lethbridge.”

The merge, the release says, will help improve the development of hockey players in Alberta, and ensure competitive balance.

Despite the loss on the Midget AAA team in Medicine Hat, Schultz says it’s hard not to stay positive about the decision.

“After our initial discussion with them, we went from six teams in the south to three, meaning both Lethbridge and us were losing all three of our teams, and they were going to put three teams in different places,” he said. “I’m positive in the fact that we presented our case to Hockey Alberta. We let them know what our plan is and the goal that we have for our association.

“They believed in us after that meeting, and they went from having no teams in Medicine Hat to giving us two of our own still. I feel like that’s a bonus. I feel like that’s a positive.”