The 100 Mile Oldtimers Hockey Association is now 15 years old, and it has some notable changes this season.
“We were maybe half-a-dozen players short of our numbers last year, so went with four teams instead of five this year,” said the new president of the league, Phil Doddridge.
Despite losing a team, the president says the league is still running just fine. In fact, it allows the league to play more games than they would be able to with five teams for the same amount of money.
How the league will play out in its final weeks as one team seeks dominance is yet to be determined.
“It will change the structure of playoffs a little bit. We may go to a full round-robin style playoffs,” said Doddridge.
Another change is all of the league’s teams are competing against each other at the Lac La Hache arena. Last season, the league would play one game in 100 Mile House at the South Cariboo Recreation Centre and two in the more northerly community.
“We wanted to make sure we could support the Lac la Hache arena,” said Doddridge, adding that so far it’s run very smoothly.
Doddridge said he’d still like to see the league have five teams or even possibly grow to have a sixth one, but he said he understands that people can have busy lives.
“They’ve got kids to do stuff with and when they find the time or when they choose to come to play with us, that’s a benefit for us,” he said.
The TimberMart Thunder are currently winning the four-team league with four wins and a tie for nine points.
“We have a really great group of hockey players this year, as we do every year. It’s fun [and] it’s competitive,” said Doddridge.