Victoria Grizzlies News

IT'S NOT FOR GOLD, JUST ANOTHER TWO POINTS HOPE TO HAVE

IT'S NOT FOR GOLD, JUST ANOTHER TWO POINTS HOPE TO HAVE

January 05, 2010 Cleve Dheensaw ©Times Colonist -

The gods of scheduling didn’t do the Victoria Grizzlies any favours for their B.C. Hockey League matchup today at 7:15 p.m. against the Nanaimo Clippers at Bear Mountain Arena.

There is one game that truly matters tonight in junior hockey. So the Grizzlies are reminding fans there are plenty of TV screens scattered around Bear Mountain Arena to watch the latter stages of the Canada-U.S. gold-medal final of the world championship.

“If fans are interested in the world junior game, but also in seeing the Grizzlies, we have TVs all over the place [inside Bear Mountain Arena] and hope that people come down early so they can watch the third period of the [Canada-U.S.] final here at the rink,” said Reza Binab, business manager of the Grizzlies.

“People do that all the time [when televised sporting events conflict with live Grizzlies games].”

The Kamloops Blazers of the Western Hockey League are pushing back the start time of their home game tonight against Everett to 8 p.m. to allow fans to watch the world junior final before coming to the rink, but Binab said such a move wasn’t practical for his club on a weekday.

Binab noted, with a chuckle, the Vancouver Canucks also play tonight.

“It seems it’s a no-win,” he said.

The Grizzlies would settle for a win-win on the ice, though, to follow up Saturday’s 4-2 victory over the Clippers (16-16-9) in Nanaimo. That was a good way to end the Christmas break for the Victoria club as it moved to 20-14-7 and continued as a mild surprise in the BCHL. Built to peak last year to host the RBC Cup National Junior A championship tournament at Bear Mountain, little was expected of the Grizzlies this season. Vic Gervais’ team, however, continues to defy the form charts.

“That was a good start to the season . . . none of the experts thought we would win as many games to Christmas as we did,” said head coach Gervais.

“But these kids work hard for us every night. Alberni is having a great year but the [Coastal Conference] is up for grabs. We can beat anybody in our conference. Saturday was a huge way to start the post Christmas portion. Our players came back from the break rejuvenated. We had a lot of injuries before the break but everybody is back now.”

After dealing with the Clippers tonight, the Grizzlies next play against Burnaby on Saturday at the Bear.