The Kenai River Brown Bears re-start the regular season in the Midwest Division of the North American Hockey League on January 2nd against the Chippewa Steel in Wisconsin, as the Brown Bears continue dealing with COVID-19 protocols and restrictions.
The Brown Bears currently remain based in Minnesota, playing games in Wisconsin, and planning a delayed return to Alaska. The present plan revises the return of the Brown Bears to Soldotna for Junior A league play to mid-February (at the earliest).
Kenai River Brown Bears General Manager Chris Hedlund confirmed the return to Alaska may not develop until mid-February.
” No, we (Brown Bears) won’t be back in January. With the restrictions on, we are looking at a February chunk (in schedule) right now with our next group, but we’re not coming back in January, we won’t be able to co that. We had to make a decision in early December because of how tickets are purchased; we have to buy them and we would waste them if we didn’t plan out.” “With still the travel challenge that we don’t have any clarity on; as well as, the Soldotna Sports Center’s minimal fans, it just doesn’t make sense to come back yet.”
The initial step to restarting the regular season after a Force Pause in Minnesota was regrouping the team for a January 2nd contest.
Chris Hedlund explained the efforts and issues for the restart.
“We did require every player to come in with a negative Covid test which is what we did at the beginning of the year and then following the same league protocols for temp checks, for self evaluation for symptoms. Doing all the same stuff we were before. There was no travel issues that I’ve heard.”
Pressing matters now for the Brown Bears, formalizing their roster, abiding by team and league COVID-19 protocols and finding ice to play on as Minnesota is changing their restrictions on indoor hockey.
Chris Hedlund discussed roster size and protocols.
Roster
” Basically the same. We didn’t have a full roster before because that roster number used to be 23, then 24. We’re still under a 27-man roster because we haven’t paired down. We’re allowed to carry 27, we were only carrying 25.”
Ice Availability
“We actually looked at ice in Wisconsin because we’re not far from the border. We’re doing some outdoor stuff, we’re doing some dryland stuff. We do have the team in Minnesota. What we have is a multiple page, many page protocol for safety for managing within our team and against opponents. Right now our challenge is what is the Alaska travel government requirements. Because nothing’s changed we haven’t developed anything deeper than that. It’s a 15-page document. Absolutely have a very detailed document on things that were supposed to pay attention to, If someone gets sick what the isolation process, what guidelines do we have. Must be 10-15 pages of protocols for home games, away games, busing; it doesn’t really talk about flying. That’s the piece we have to get from Alaska government and that’s why we are tentative about coming back (to Alaska) because we don’t have that detail from them.”
The Brown Bears are also going to be faced with new mask mandates in Minnesota starting January 4th.
” Minnesota just announced yesterday (Monday, Dec. 28), so it kind-of caught us off-guard in the scheduling process, that starting Monday the 4th (January) everybody on ice will have to wear a mask as well. We just don’t know how long that is for, we just know that’s what the January 4th statement is–it could be for one week, could be for two weeks-don’t know what that means yet. There’s really no long-distance communication happening, just day one communication. That’s why we’re fortunate that we are going to be out-of-state for our games early so we won’t have to play games with masks on.”
The Kenai River Brown Bears battle the Chippewa Steel in Wisconsin on Saturday, January 2nd. More details at kenairiverbrownbears.com.
