Robb Fenton - Staff Writer

This Friday, it’s for real.
The Lloydminster Bobcats have had six tune up games and beginning this weekend, the games are going to count in the standings as they open up the 2009-2010 AJHL season hosting the defending champions, Grande Prairie Storm.
“Extremely excited,” head coach Tom Keca said, describing the mood around the rink. “As a coaching staff, you bring your own level of excitement, but then you also feed off of your players. Full marks to our veteran group that came back. For the most part, everybody came back in really good shape, we’re really impressed with the fitness level. Some guys know they have to take the next step and that’s the biggest thing. We’re really excited by the way the team is shaping up.”
The ‘Cats will be looking to get off to a good start, something they have had trouble doing in the past.
It won’t be an easy task, however, as they face the Storm for a pair on the weekend, then travel to Spruce Grove for their first road game next week.
“Not just GP, but the first three games including Spruce Grove. There’s no better way to use the supposed top teams as a measuring stick. Grande Prairie are the defending champions, always know to have a physical team who makes it difficult to get to the front of the net,” Keca said of the first opponents the Bobcats will face. “We feel like we’re okay size wise, but we have to play a lot bigger than we are. We talk about team toughness, not necessarily having line brawls and things like that, but going to the areas you know you’re going to get hit, but still going there to compete. We have a group here that’s willing to do that.”

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Sandy Beach hosted the Horseshoe Tournament and Corn Roast on Sunday at the park. The always popular event is into its 17th year. – Colin Budd Photo

City seeking public input on infrastructure

Katie Ryan - Staff Writer

While the city is tackling road improvements this summer, officials are also planning ahead and are seeking the public’s feedback.
On Wednesday an open house was held by the city and  ISL Engineering and Land Services on the Lloydminster Transportation Infrastructure Master Plan (TIMP), so that residents and businesses had an opportunity to review the plan and voice their views on how the community’s future infrastructure should develop.
“The city did one (TIMP) in 2000 and it’s really out of date now,” said Kirk Morrison, the city’s transportation engineer.
“Once this plan is in place, it will provide a framework for the city to look at capital budgets for projects for the next five years and who knows, five years from now things could change a lot  again. The whole plan is to prioritize some of these projects that we know we have to do.”
While the turnout wasn’t as high as they would have liked, Morrison said a number of issues were brought to the forefront.
“For the people that did show up, I think fairly consistently people are concerned with 50 Avenue or Highway 17, basically its congestion. Bike paths were another issue that was coming out as a concern, developing more of a continuous network and when we do new subdivisions, make them more bike  friendly,” said  Morrison.

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Robb Fenton - Staff Writer

The Lloydminster Bobcats had a plan in mind when they scheduled six pre-season game and as they wrapped up their final weekend, the plan has paid off.
The ‘Cats won their final two games against the Camrose Kodiaks, winning 3-2 on the road Friday and 4-3 in overtime Saturday at home and although they still have some tough decisions to make regarding the roster, the two games helped immensely.
“I thought it was good. I thought our defensive zone coverage has come miles in the past week. I thought we communicated well and other than the two partial breakaways we gave up, I didn’t think we gave up a lot of great scoring chances,” Bobcats head coach Tom Keca said. “We kept them to the outside.”
Goaltending has been a huge positive for the ‘Cats this pre-season with all three goalies remaining on the roster having very strong outings each time they hit the ice.
Tyler Briggs picked up the win Saturday night.
“Briggs looked a little nervous in the first period, but he settled down and made some key stops for us and your veterans, you want them to step up in these types of situations and to get the tying goal from Homey (Chad Hohmann) and the winning goal from Chis (Kory Chisholm), it was great to see,” Keca said. “This was our last exhibition game, we’ve gotten better as the exhibition season has gone on and the next game is going to be for real. Our guys are excited.”

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MP Leon Benoit announced that the federal and Alberta provincial government will each invest $625,000 in Lakeland’s Lloydminster and Vermilion campus security. See Tuesday’s Source for more information. - Andrea Nicholl Photo

Benoit calls election talk “absurd”

Colin Budd - Staff Writer

The Liberals came away from their retreat in Sudbury, ON this week claiming the country is heading to an election as soon as possible. Leaving Vegreville-Wainwright MP Leon Benoit less than pleased to have the country heading back to the polls for the fourth time in five years.
“Why now?” he asked Wednesday from his office in Mannville. “To me it’s just absurd. And you have to ask the question, why are they doing this? They’ve supported us every step along the way since the last election, they supported us for over three years in a minority government – which is quite remarkable – before the last election and all of a sudden now they want to bring on an election.”
Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff told his caucus that he had concerns about Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s record, including unemployment statistics and budget deficit and also pointed to four benchmarks he had laid out in June for the Conservatives that weren’t reached.

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Robb Fenton - Staff Writer

Now the tough part starts for the Lloydminster Universal Heat.
After completing their training camp with a red and white game this past Sunday, the Heat will now have to find the right pieces to the puzzle for the 2009-2010 AMBHL season, which begins in about three weeks.
“I thought it was a good intra-squad game. There are a large number of boys with potential and unfortunately we have to make some releases. I was pleased with the intensity, I was pleased with the effort and work ethic which is promising going forward,” Heat head coach Brian Hozack said. “There was some quality skill plays and in this league you obviously need skill, so I thought it was really good.”
With so much turnover, it was important for the Heat to run a long camp to find the next 17 players that will suit up for the team.
The team hit the ice for four days, with two skates a day for the past week and Hozack was happy with the development he saw from the majority of the kids on the ice.
“The boys are starting to become a little bit more comfortable with their surroundings as far as being out there in a camp environment. Some of them you’ll see move up and get stronger and some plateau a little bit, but I’m pleased with the progress of most of them,” Hozack said.

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The wheels on the bus went round and round on Monday morning, taking Lloyd students to school for their first day back.   - Andrea Nicholl Photo

Alberta confirms record deficit

Katie Ryan - Staff Writer

Alberta is in the red. Last week Finance Minister Iris Evans released the province’s 2009-10 first quarter fiscal update, showing a  record  $7 billion deficit, which has the potential to increase by the end of the year if natural gas prices continue to fall.
“One thing I think people need to keep in mind is that the Alberta Government has released their quarterly updates in good times and bad times, consistently straight through,” said local MLA and Treasury Board president Lloyd Snelgrove.
“We give people not necessarily the numbers that we would like to have, but we’d like them to have the facts. Very few other governments give quarterly updates and we think it’s very important for people to see the same numbers that we are dealing with.”
The new numbers the province is now dealing with include a deficit that is $2.2 billion higher than the original estimate of $4.7 billion.
Alberta’s revenue has dropped by $2.1 billion and now sits at $29.6 billion, while expenses have increased by $72 million to $36.4 billion. Lower natural gas prices are mostly to blame for the revenue drop.

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Local juniors looking good, but still have some tough decisions

Robb Fenton - Staff Writer

It was a bit of an up and down weekend for the Lloydminster Bobcats, but it was a good one for the evaluation process.
The ‘Cats split a pair of exhibition games with the Fort McMurray Oil Barons, winning 3-2 in overtime Saturday, before falling 7-5 Sunday afternoon.
“I thought it was a good game and obviously as a coaching staff we’re using all these exhibition games as an evaluation of not only our players, but our system work and I think the two games against Fort McMurray served a purpose,” Bobcats head coach, Tom Keca said. “Saturday was an exciting overtime game for the fans and today (Sunday) there were a lot more goals, I thought the offensive play by both teams was better. Our defensive zone is something we’re going to have to address, but we’ve only had two practices together.”
“I like what we’ve seen. There are some young kids that we weren’t quite sure what we were going to get, especially in more uptempo games, like today’s (Sunday’s),” Bobcats general manager, Jim Crosson said. “Fort McMurray had a lot of guys in there that are going to be on the team and we’re still half and half and the kids we had in there I thought were very good. There are some kids that stepped up and that was nice to see. When you weren’t sure what you’re going to see and they come in and step up in an uptempo game like on the weekend. It’s encouraging.”

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