By Nathan Kanter

AAA Stars drop head coach days before season opener

Sep 27, 2016 | 2:50 PM

Just three days before the start of the Battlefords AAA Stars regular season, the team decided to make a coaching change.

Head Coach Darren Martens was hired in August to replace Jody Reiter, who stepped down after four seasons because of time commitment issues, but on Monday, the team replaced Martens with Jean Fauchon.

Stars chairperson Bruce Yockey said the change was made because of a difference in philosophy.

“The decision is a hard one and you don’t want to cut somebody off before they get a chance, but we just didn’t like the direction things were going,” Yockey said. “We have some philosophical differences on how our team and even our individual players should develop … compared with how Darren was doing things.

“[The board] decided to make a change earlier rather than down the road.”

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Martens, who only coached for three pre-season games, wasn’t particularly happy with the decision. He said he was blessed to have had the opportunity to coach the team, even for just a little while.

“I am very disappointed in the organization,” Martens said. “I know the players and I were on the same page … [and] I wish them all a great year. They are a great group of young men.”

Coming into the fold with little time to spare is Fauchon, who grew up in the Battlefords and played two years of midget AAA for the Stars. He was the coach of the female AAA Battlefords Sharks from 2008-11 and has been an assistant with the U-18 team Saskatchewan female team since 2013.

Fauchon said the board thought he would be a good fit in part because he has been helping the Stars out with video and goalie coaching for the past four and a half seasons.

“I was asked [on Monday] if it would be something I would be interested in doing since I knew the program and the culture,” Fauchon said. “The vets that are there, I’ve worked with them before, and I’ve worked with [assistant coach] Lee [Ulmer] before. So yeah it was something that was kind of news to me.”

With the regular season now just two days away, there’s a lot to go over in not a lot of time.

“We’re going to have to pack some stuff in here into the next two practices,” Fauchon said. “We’re going to be doing some video before and after just to get everybody on the same page. It’s going to be tough but we’re going to get it done.”

The Stars went 2-1-0 in the pre-season, defeating the Beardy’s Blachawks 5-3, while splitting their two games with the Saskatoon Blazers, a 2-1 win and 3-0 loss.

The regular season officially begins for the Stars on Thursday with a home tilt against the Saskatoon Contacts. Puck drop is set for 7:30 p.m.

Nathan Kanter is battlefordsNOW’s sports reporter and voice of the Battlefords North Stars. He can be reached at Nathan.kanter@jpbg.ca or tweet him @NathanKanter11