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Jasper will not have a new Junior A team for the 2019/20 season.
The Western States Hockey League (WSHL) was looking to include Jasper in its Canadian expansion and talked with a group of potential owners in January that included teacher Chuck Barker and Jasper Brewing Co’s Justin Melnyk.
But with a deadline for the end of May for new teams to sign up, the timing was “too tight” and Jasper missed the bid.
“We were looking for some local investors and that kind of thing,” said Barker. “A number of things were just factors in the end.”
Last year, the WSHL expanded into western Canada with a Provinces Division that had originally been announced to play as its own league called the Western Provinces Hockey Association (WPHA).
But earlier this year, the WSHL severed ties with the WPHA and its teams directly operated by the owners of the WPHA.
Barker said that was good news for him and the other potential owners because they did not want to work with the WPHA.
“We only wanted to work with the WSHL so that stuff going on in January, we put it on the shelf,” he said. “Once the WPHA was no longer involved, that’s when the talks opened up again.”
But by then it was late April, only a month before the 2019/20 registration deadline.
And to get a team ready for Jasper, Barker and his team need solid investment, player recruitment, billet families to provide housing, and a regular spot on the ice.
Barker said they are still keen to go forward and are waiting for next year now. He said he wants to see the league, how it goes and look at its stability.
“From a community standpoint it is valuable and we would like to see some of those local players be able to stay in town, in high school, if they wanted to go to that level,” he said.
“That is a huge part of it and we think it is a great thing for hockey culture in Jasper.
“A community team would be weekly games, almost like a weekly community event.”
There are 24 teams signed up for the 2019/20 WSHL season from across North America, including California, Colorado, Oregon and Utah.
The Provinces division that Jasper would have joined has teams in Hinton, Edson, Barrhead, Cold Lake and Meadow Lake for the 2019/20 season. Barrhead is new for this season.
Ron White, president and commissioner of the WSHL, said: “Everything is fine. We have five teams,Jasper would have been the sixth, but it’s going really good.
“The best thing [for Jasper] to do is get it resolved by Christmas.
“Get the group together, finish the documentation and put it forward - and get to work.”
