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Speak Up

For the past 22 seasons, I have watched the New Brunswick Interscholastic Athletic Association's hockey system grow by leaps and bounds.

New teams, and new schools, have allowed the NBIAA's ice squads to prosper to a level not anticipated in the mid-1980s.

However, improvements can still be made.

Here are my seven recommendations to the NBIAA they can possibly work on in the off-season.

- Stricter rules should be set in place to stop schools from over-recruiting players, or using too many skaters, who were born outside of New Brunswick or are from the United States or Europe. Some member teams have used this (somewhat) open process in recent years to put junior elite-level squads on the ice. High school hockey in New Brunswick is a system designed for school sprit and promotion of local talent. It's not, and shouldn't be about, stacking squads just to win a banner. We need to have an import rule that works - plain and simple.

- An A division should be encouraged so smaller schools can enter squads for scholastic play, or drop down to AA if they are out-classed in the division because of a lack of player numbers. You have great teams at the AA and AAA levels throughout the province, so maybe its time to give these ‘low pop' facilities a try at building a program designed by them and for them.

- PRP and SSHS of Campbellton have not had a boys program for more than 20 years, and that's a shame. The NBIAA should do everything in its power to try to convince organizers in Restigouche Centre to re-launch these teams for play in the Northern Conference. Campbellton has been a hot-bed for hockey for almost 100 years, but not seeing a city team, representing the boys, on the ice for two decades remains a head-scratcher.

- More regulations should be set in place to protect players, coaches, officials, the media, and off-ice volunteers from the verbal jabs, and taunting, which occur on a more-than-frequent basis during key regular season and playoff games. My solution? Put a NBIAA-designated rink person in place at each arena to take names of these tormentors and bar these people for life. People come to games to watch the game, not the stands.

- The NBIAA's playoff format should go back to best-of-five series for boys and best-of-threes for girls. The current super tournament format may be great for some, but you can't build north-south rivalries like WHS-AQV or other classic set-tos by one or two games a year in on-off or tournament play.

- A point system should be put in place to allow all the NBIAA's top teams to be ranked, by a provincial panel, from #1 to #8. Junior and other high school leagues across the nation do this. A weekly ranking format would not only drive more media attention towards big games, it would also give certain squads something real to shoot for during the regular season other than league banners.

- The NBIAA hockey system needs a ‘sugar daddy' to offset rising fuel costs. Maybe it's time for one of the major gas companies to come forward and given certain school squads who travel long distances to games and tournaments a break on pump prices. Maybe an NBIAA card which would give teams a 20 cent-per-litre rebate on fuel? Works for me!