Farmers banking on youth this season in Tiger Hills
- Details
- Published on Monday, November 4, 2013
By: Lanny Stewart
myWestman.ca
The 2013-2014 Tiger Hills Hockey League season has begun for the Neepawa Farmers and with it comes change to the senior club as several notable veterans are no longer on the team.
The Farmers, last year's league finalists, find themselves without the services of four key players from a year ago. Forward Shane Jury, who led the league in scoring last season, Mike Nicholson, Bryan White. Jury netted 25 goals and 61 points last season, while White finished in a tie for second overall with 51 points. Nicholson meanwhile, was sixth in the league with 16 goals and 42 points.
Replacing the offensive output by said players will be a tough task, so the members of the team have bought into a 'scoring by committee' approach this year. The team is expected to rely on veterans such as Cam Tibbett, Lance Nugent and Neil Ernest to help fill the offensive void. Meanwhile, younger players such as blueliner Tieler Fenning Cox and forwards Bret Levandoski and Clarke Rempel will also be asked to step up when called upon. All three players are former members of the Neepawa Tigers high school hockey team.
"I think our average age has dropped from around 28 years of age to around 22 [years of age]," said Farmers blueliner Rodney White.
"We're going to have to play a lot better team defence and we're going to have to kill penalties better and take advantage of our power plays because we don't have that one guy who can go out and put up 60 or 70 points in 20 games," he continued. "We're going to have to have everybody contribute."
Last year's captain Ian Hockin is also no longer on the squad and it forced the members on the team to vote on who will take over wearing the "C" this season. The players wound up choosing blueliner Devon Speiss as their new captain. Speiss is expected to play a lot of minutes on the back end for the Farmers this year, says White.
"He's a good leader and not to mention, he's playing around 30 minutes a night, so it helps that our captain is our best defencemen and one of our best players. He's a good hockey player."
Brad Nelson has returned this year between the pipes and will once again receive the majority of the starts in net for Neepawa. Curtis Nelson (Brad's cousin) has joined the club this year and will be the club's backup netminder. Curtis was in net for the Farmers first victory of the year, which was a shut out win over the Pilot Mound Pilots last Friday night.
The club, which currently sits with a 1-2 record this season, also has a new look behind the bench. Glen Nelson will be lending a helping hand as the club's coach and is joined by assistant Jim White. The duo replaces the coaching staff from a year ago, which was led by Dale Evenson.
The Farmers next game action is on Saturday when they travel to Carberry to take on the Plainsmen.
