After getting a few days off to refresh their bodies and minds thanks to the annual Christmas break, the Cochrane Generals will start the second half of their Heritage Hockey League (HJHL) season on Jan. 4 and 5.
The team got back to work on Dec. 27 with their first practice post-Christmas and will also have one tonight in order to prepare for the weekend slate of games against the Strathmore Wheatland Kings and division-leading Coaldale Copperheads as well as a Tuesday match up with the Okotoks Bisons.
“It’s always a welcome thing to have a break. We did have practice on Thursday and it was mostly skills and drills. We got the guys moving, lots of shots for the goaltenders to get them back into the groove of things obviously and we had some injuries there at the end of December … some of the guys were back to full contact so everybody is healthy and were back at practice so hopefully everyone is ready to go so we can jump right into it this weekend because we have three important games,” said Generals head coach Travis McMillan.
“It’s definitely a big thing (to be able to rest up some injured players), most teams will go through those motions, but considering we’ve relied on our depth guys quite a bit this season, it’s nice to get some of these guys back even though we were delightfully surprised by the play of some of our younger players. River Ross and Vance Wesley were hurting a little bit there and obviously having Brandon Aab out of the line up due to mono was a considerable blow to our top two lines.”
“The break is very vital and important for most programs, but seemingly came at the perfect time for us. We were obviously pretty banged up so it gave us an opportunity to rest some guys and allow them to kind of relax. They didn’t have to push themselves in order to be game ready right away because we did have a bit of a break. Not having any ice times really slows down the pace a little bit, just enough for the guys to kind of take a step back and recover the proper way instead of guys scrambling a little bit to get back into the line up when they maybe aren’t completely healthy. Thankfully, the injury bug kind of hit us at the right time so that we’ll be at full strength going into some fairly crucial games.”
McMillan said it’s a bit of an adjustment for teams to have some time off and then have to be able to jump back into a busy schedule, where the month of January sees the Generals playing in eight games.
“It’s always a question that floats around the locker room and league – about how ready teams are going to be going into the second half of the schedule. Hopefully, the guys pick it up immediately because we do have a tough portion of our schedule coming up,” McMillan said.
“You can’t really come out of the gate flatfooted, you need to be able to get everything under control right away in order to have success. If you fall behind early, you may be looking at a tough playoff match up so I think the mental strength needs to be there and everything else will kind of follow. The guys were on the ice during their own time such as being at the outdoor rink so hopefully we can make that jump and try to continue the success we’ve had.”
With three crucial games upcoming, McMillan hopes his troops are ready to go when the puck is dropped on Jan. 4.
“Strathmore is a run-and gun-team. They like to bang bodies, get under your skin and they’re familiar with our returning players as well so their identity is pretty well known. I think we just need to play our game in order to be successful and that’s something we’ve been doing, so I hope that continues,” McMillan said.
“We just need to move fast, get plenty of shots on net and create some scoring opportunities and hopefully we don’t get into any penalty trouble like we did at the beginning of the season. I think the flavour of the second half will be our teams mental strength … be able to bear down knowing that all three of these games are important.”
“Having three games in a row against three very good teams, you need to be confident that the team can get six points this weekend and if they don’t, at least getting four or five points. You want to be hopeful and anticipate that you can get six points and winning all three games, especially getting everyone back healthy I hope we show in our play that we’re capable of winning all three of these games.”
