Pearl Lorentzen
Lakeside Leader

“We’re going to have brand new jerseys, and nowhere to wear them,” says long-time Kodiak Connie Schultz.

The Kodiaks are the women’s hockey team in Slave Lake. In a normal year, they compete in a league which includes teams in Alberta and British Columbia, but the competetive season is cancelled because of COVID-19.

“We can’t go inter-provincial,” Schultz says. “We’ll just have a really fun year.”

However, she adds, Kodiaks and some of the other teams have booked ice time and will be going ahead with practices and potentially a few tournaments.

“I think, because we’re having a fun year,” Schultz says, a number of older players have returned to play this year. These players found it hard to commit to travelling every weekend.

Schultz describes the COVID-19 restrictions as “quite the rigmarole for sure.” However, one of the other teams came up with a COVID-19 questionnaire app, which the whole league is using. This makes tracking responses much easier.

The Kodiak’s new jerseys were purchased with a donation from the Emes-Lukan Memorial Society. This Slave Lake group usually holds a fundraiser golf in the summer, but this fundraiser was one of the victims of COVID-19.