Western Prairie Klippers roster coming together: What's next?

Things are beginning to heat up for the Western Prairie Junior Klippers inaugural season of play. The new Saskatchewan Junior Female Hockey League team held their first official skate as a team last Friday.

Regular season details should be coming next from the league, as it's been an exciting time for female hockey in Saskatchewan. The Klippers have put enough pen-to-paper for an idea of what the roster might look like come opening night.

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As the pieces continue to come together for the SJFHL as a league, we spoke with Klippers' Head Coach Dale Jackson about the Friday skate.

It wasn't their official training camp, but Jackson was still encouraged to see the team come together.

"We weren't going to have the numbers at that point in time to get on the ice and have a full scale camp, and we're not in the position where we are going to have to choose players right now." said Jackson.

Interest in the league certainly isn't lacking. The new coach feels a lack of commitment right now might just have to do with the uncertainty around a new league, adding that the door hasn't been closed for some players still on the fence this year. 

Jackson shared the U22 aged players were joined on the ice by some other young talent, potential future Klippers.

"When we were on the ice Saturday for about three hours, we had a lot of the U15 area players out along with some of our U18. It was a great opportunity for me to hopefully meet some of the hopefully up and coming Klippers players that could come and play with our organization in the future here."

Jackson also got to meet some of the newly signed players for the first time. It may not have been the average camp weekend, but it's all systems go for the new team in yellow-and-blue.

"We have a full roster of players who are committed, and we will be rolling them out onto the website soon." 

Next up for the league will be a scheduling meeting. Before the official schedule comes out the team hopes to have some exhibition games lined up. Things are moving along quickly.

"Try Saskatoon or Outlook. Whoever is available to play us here, or we'll travel to them. Get on the ice as a group and start playing some games here headed into the regular season."

Jackson and the team have another skate lined up for this Friday.