Regional bantam hockey teams will be iced in the Lower Mainland next season.
BC Hockey has announced that associations in the Lower Mainland will take part in a pilot project which it says will offer “ground-breaking options for young hockey players.”
At a recent meeting of the Pacific Coast Amateur Hockey Association (PCAHA), the association voted to join the BC Hockey Zone Program Pilot project for the 2019-2020 season in the bantam age division.
The BC Hockey pilot project has been studying the expansion of residential boundaries over the past two seasons, with programming being offered in the East and West Kootenays, North Central, North East, North West, Okanagan-Mainline and Yukon.
For the 2019-2020 season, the BC Hockey Zone Pilot Program will include five Major Bantam AAA teams (ages 13-14) in the Lower Mainland participating in the BC Hockey Major Bantam AAA League.
“We are very pleased with this addition to the zone programming pilot project,” said BC Hockey chief executive officer, Barry Petrachenko. “Over the past two years this pilot has provided young hockey players across our membership with enhanced minor hockey programming options and expanding these options to the Lower Mainland is a major step forward for our sport.”
Pacific Coast found it a good step forward.
“The PCAHA has closely monitored this pilot project over the past two years, and we found it to be in line with the desire of our associations to offer this sort of quality program to our participants,” said Lynne Kiang, president of the PCAHA. “Getting everyone onside was a key step in the process, and we now look ahead to working with BC Hockey on the program development and implementation.”
