The birds are back in their cage, as the Nipawin Hawks welcomed players back to the Cage with their training camp.
The two-day camp featured approximately 60 players ranging in age from 1997-born players through to 2002-born players.
This year’s camp went well, said Doug Johnson, the head coach and general manager, who noted it was competitive.
“There’s always some surprises and you always see some guys that really did a lot of work over the summer that’s really helped their game and then you see the guys that, a little disappointing, didn’t do the work... we’re at a strong point right now and hopefully get stronger as this season progresses.”
With a number of key players returning to the club this season, the off-season was important in their development, and Johnson said those players took the summer seriously and came into camp in great shape.
“Our returners all have done the work and they’re hungry to get after it because I think most of them are tired of the semifinals and want to get somewhere better.”
A lot of the surprise and disappointment in camp comes from the recruited players, and this year was no different, said Johnson.
“You try and tell them what to expect but some take you seriously and some don’t.”
With a number of younger players in camp, including several from the 2017 Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League Bantam draft, Johnson had the opportunity to see a lot of those players for the first time for an extended period of time, and said he was pleased with what he saw.
“Some of the older groups were away at Western League camps but that ’02 group, a lot of them attended and [were] very happy. For me it was kind of the first time I was able to see them in an extended period and just the quality of people and the quality of play was outstanding for that age group.”
The Hawks went into the pre-season slate with 35 players on the roster, but Johnson noted that numbers will change depending on the day.
“Right now we have 35 but that will be down quickly. We have some guys that are making some decisions easy for us and we’ll make those decisions probably [Sept. 5].”
