Meota Combines goalie Cam Taylor is locked in during early season SPHL action. (Martin Martinson/battlefordsNOW Staff)

By Martin Martinson

Sask Prairie Hockey League

Battlefords rinks to see busy weekend of SPHL hockey

Nov 16, 2023 | 5:00 AM

It will be a busy weekend around the rinks in the Battlefords, with a full slate of Sask Prairie Hockey League (SPHL) action on tap for Friday and Saturday night.

In North Battleford, the Meota Combines will play back-to-back home games Friday and Saturday night at the Access Communications Centre against Perdue (Friday) and Raddison (Saturday), while across the bridge, the Battlefords Beaver Blues will host Redberry at Battleford Arena for their second game of the year.

Meota Combines

The defending SPHL champions have picked up right where they left off last spring, with a pair of wins over Redberry (5-1) and Neilburg (7-5) to sit a league-best 2-0-0 heading into action this weekend.

Despite the hot start, the Combines aren’t a team to rest on their laurels, and especially against a couple of motivated clubs as veteran forward Aaron Cadrin points out.

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“Perdue came into Battleford last weekend and beat them and Battleford was a top team in the league last season, so that’s a big eye-opener for the rest of the league,” Cadrin said. “[Then] Radisson’s coming to town Saturday and we’ve played them the last two years in the semis, so we’ve got a bit of a rivalry there, and we’ve had that one marked on our calendars.”

Both Combines’ games this weekend will begin at 8 p.m. at the ACC (Civic Centre).

Battlefords Beaver Blues

The Beaver Blues will return to play at Battleford Arena looking for a quick bounce-back from their opening game of the season, coming up just short in a 6-5 loss to Perdue last weekend.

Playing host to the Redberry Raiders, veteran forward Kody Wolff said as a younger team this year the Beaver Blues showed some nice spark in their opening game, which they’ll be looking to build on in search of that all-important first win this weekend.

“We do have a fairly new team this year with a lot of young guys that have never seen senior hockey, so it’s not been a bad start, and I’d say we have the potential to be a pretty good team again this year,” Wolff said.

“Our outlook looks pretty good for the weekend, and hopefully we can bounce back and get a win under our belts and maybe bring the spirits up a bit and go from there.”

Friday’s Beaver Blues game will be an 8:30 p.m. start at Battleford Arena.

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Martin.Martinson@pattisonmedia.com

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