The Prince George Spruce Kings are trading places.
Following last week’s BCHL Board of Governors meeting, the Spruce Kings will be moving to the Interior next season as the league goes to two nine-team conferences following the addition of the Cranbrook Bucks.
General Manager, Mike Hawes told MyPGNow.com while they might be spending more time on the bus, the travel won’t be foreign to them.
“Trips to Trail the Spruce Kings have been doing for years so the amount of time the trips take to Wenatchee or Cranbrook are very similar to our trip to Trail so we’re kind of used to that being the northernmost team.”
However, he does admit the move from the Mainland Division does carry some mixed emotions.
“It’s a little bit bittersweet for us in the sense that we really enjoyed our time in the Mainland Division. I think that division really worked well for us for many reasons, the level of competition plus we get a lot of kids from the Lower Mainland so that was good for a lot of players on our team.”
“On the positive side, it’s going to give us an opportunity to renew some old rivalries we have with Vernon and Penticton when we were in the interior division after first joining the BCHL.”
As for how this might impact the team’s budget, Hawes says it shouldn’t make a difference.
“We are the northernmost team so we spend the most nights in hotels in the league and that’s kind of par for the course, we do budget for that and moving into the Interior conference next year isn’t going to add any more hotel nights for us.”
Hawes adds the move won’t have an impact on recruiting based on the team’s on-ice success in the last few seasons.
The league has also announced that it is moving from a 58-game schedule to 54, as well as a later start date in September.
On top of the changes to next season, the Board also voted to slightly alter the playoff format for this season by having the two crossover teams re-seed in the Interior Division based on their point totals, rather than being put into the seventh and eight slots automatically.