Photo Credit: Shane Clausing

By Shane Clausing

Storm Resume Play

Storm set to resume season following another lengthy layoff

Apr 15, 2021 | 1:29 PM

The Grande Prairie Storm are back on the ice and heading on the road for the first time since their season came to a halt on April 1.

The club is opening up a four-game cohort series against the Fort McMurray Oil Barons from April 16-17 and April 23-24.

The Storm was set to conclude the first phase of their regular-season cohort schedule with Drayton Valley and Whitecourt on the Easter weekend, but several positive COVID-19 cases were found in the cohort and forced all three teams to suspend regular-season activity for the next two weeks.

Storm Head Coach and General Manager Mike Vandekamp says while some members of his team were infected with COVID-19, the players are feeling well and healthy.

He adds their biggest challenge heading into this weekend series will be rediscovering the game.

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“It’s been the story of the season,” said Vandekamp. “Every time we build a little bit of momentum it seems we’ve been shut down for two weeks, a month or even longer. It’s just one of those restarts again.”

“We only got to skate twice before we got on the bus to go back into game action. I think we’ve probably lost a step again, unfortunately, but there’s nothing we can do about that. We’ll just have to catch up as fast as we can.”

While the hockey club has been strongly impacted by the pandemic, Vandekamp says it has been frustrating, but he’s seen some things from his club that he hopes they can build off of.

“I think we’ve been competitive which has been great, I’d like to see us play a little bit smarter at times. I think some of that is we haven’t had a lot of games and we haven’t really established the structure with a new coach and all new players, it just hasn’t been a great year for that unfortunately.”

“You can use it as an excuse, but there just hasn’t been enough hockey. It seems like we’re still at the beginning stages when it comes to how we want to play the game, but when it comes to playing with spirit and passion I like that side of our team.”

The Storm head into Fort McMurray with a 4-5-1 record and have lost three straight games.

Fort McMurray currently holds the AJHL’s best record at 9-0-1, but they’ve only played the Spruce Grove Saints so far this season.

You can catch all the live action for this weekend’s games on HockeyTV.