Practices, development and rave reviews in spite of the ongoing pandemic has seen interest grow in the program, which strives to offer an intensive instructional experience for players outside the auspices of the Saskatchewan Hockey Association.
That has the SSA thinking limited expansion after only a single season, and for good reason -- a planned identification camp for the Apr. 6-10 weekend has already seen a decent response with nearly a month to go before the first session.
“I think we’re approaching 75 registered already, so we’re getting up there in numbers, which is good to see,” said SSA founder and coach Dayle Wilcox. “We’re getting questions from people up to two, three hours away who are looking into what we’re doing.”
The SSA ran last season with 56 players on three teams in the Under-11 and Under-9 age classes, and had planned to hit tournaments all over the prairies and the U.S. if not for the pandemic.
The same is planned for next season, with the only question being how many players and teams they’ll have. The key will be to keep those numbers manageable while still offering a solid player-to-coach ratio and large amounts of ice time.
“I think with what we were able to provide this year and going forward, we’re not going to be able to expand huge right away,” Wilcox said. “We want to make sure we’re able to provide the same quality of product, so we need to make sure that we have coaches who are at the higher level and the ice time is there and everything.”
There was talk about even doubling in size as quickly as next season, but any plans in that direction will take time.
“We don’t want to have a whole bunch of kids in the program but then not a good base of coaches and ice time to keep the high quality we want to bring,” Wilcox said.
That’s not stopping the Academy from still taking a look at new players though -- and anyone interested is welcome to take part in the upcoming camp.
Potential participants can register through the SSA website at www.southsaskacademy.ca, where they’ll also find information on the program as a whole.
“It’s a chance to get a first look at new players before things get shut down in April, so we’re really looking forward to it,” Wilcox said.
