Photo: Shane Clausing / EverythingGP staff

By Shane Clausing

GP Storm

Storm brass encouraged with online 50/50 initiative; excited for season relaunch

Feb 23, 2021 | 5:30 AM

Grande Prairie Storm President Chris Millsap says news of the “Jackpots for Junior Hockey” program launched in partnership with the AJHL, WHL and Alberta government is encouraging for his club.

The program will allow all WHL and AJHL clubs in Alberta to collect proceeds from 50/50 draws every weekend in March.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the Storm have been left feeling a little helpless when it comes to being able to raise money to help keep their operations running.

“It’s significant and a great initiative for the league and their teams,” said Millsap. “We tried operating without our number one source of revenue, and that is fans in the stands, and the hit to us financially was obviously significant.”

“With this new 50/50 initiative, it’s an opportunity for fans across the province to support their favourite team without costing taxpayers any money. We thought that was an important way to support our organization and the others like ours.”

According to Millsap, the league had been trying to get funding for a while from the province, however, nothing came to be.

Since the NHL season kicked off in January, both the Calgary Flames and Edmonton Oilers 50/50’s moved to online and they’ve seen a large turnout from fans watching at home.

Millsap says he, the AJHL and WHL are hopeful they’ll be able to see a similar benefit when it comes to fan turnout for the draws.

“We as a league are expecting to get about $2 million out of this and that’ll be shared between the 16 teams in the league, as well as the league itself who obviously has been hit with a number of costs and the inability to cover those costs as well.”

Now that the league and its teams have been able to secure some sort of funding, the Storm are shifting their attention to the ice, as the league prepares to relaunch the 2020-21 regular season.

Compared to when the season launched last November, there are a couple of changes players will have to get used to.

Before a player can join the team at training camp, two negative COVID-19 tests will be required and the individuals are deemed asymptomatic as per the SureHire Risk Assessment Program.

The league has also committed to having players receive a PCR COVID-19 test weekly throughout the rest of the season.

If a member of the team, either a player, coach or staff, tests positive for COVID-19 at any point during the season, the team will have to isolate and suspend all in-person team activities for 14 days.

If all goes well, the season could start in early March.

Millsap says the club can’t wait to return to the ice.

“Our entire organization is excited as anything to get back going.

“This is significant when you are talking about at both the AJHL and WHL levels. These aren’t people just playing for fun, these are people who are looking to advance their careers, these are young men trying to get scholarships, move to the next level and often make hockey a career.”