By Nathan Kanter

Forward spots still up for grabs with AAA Stars following spring camp

Apr 23, 2018 | 12:00 PM

The goaltending and backend have been set but the forwards are not: That’s the case for the Battlefords AAA Stars following spring camp at the Civic Centre this past weekend.

Six defencemen have been signed, including two returners, and both goaltenders from last year, Joseph Young and Carter Serhyenko, are set to man the crease yet again according to head coach Norm Johnston. The defence will be comprised of Brayden Serhyenko and Tyson Tuck, both of whom played on the squad last year, and youngsters Ethan Grabowski (15), Logan Holm (16), Eric Robbie (15), and Cole Youngman (16). Grabowski dressed in nine games for the Stars last year as a call-up and Robbie dressed in eight.

“We’ve got six ‘D’ that we’re quite pleased with,” Johnston said. “I thought it was a good camp. The kids competed hard. We had lots of ’03s, ’02s and ’01s.”

Those defencemen were six of 35 that took part at spring camp, which totalled 97 skaters and 10 goaltenders.

Johnston said the biggest difference between this year’s camp and last year’s was a more even playing field.

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“This year there was no separation,” he said. “We did our rating score differently. I took some experience from my previous life in Hockey Regina and I brought it here. We just did it differently. We had more evaluators and the [kids] didn’t separate [themselves]. So that was the issue.”

The absence of two standout players from last year — Adam Beckman and Ty Mosimann — was a big reason nobody could separate from the rest of the pack.

Beckman led the Saskatchewan Midget AAA Hockey League in scoring and is likely going to suit up for the Spokane Chiefs of the Western Hockey League next season. If not, he’ll play for the Nipawin Hawks of the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League, where he’s already played both regular season and playoff games. Mosimann, now too old to return, led the SMAAAHL in assists with 50 and was third in points with 66. His SJHL rights are held by the La Ronge Ice Wolves but he also attended Lloydminster Bobcats (AJHL) spring camp last week.

“We didn’t have two top-end guys who could go on the ice and score every time they wanted to,” Johnston said. “It’s a more equal camp. We have more kids at the same level. Kids have to compete and really work hard to make the hockey team.”

According to the SMAAAHL website, two affiliated forwards the Stars have already committed to are Unity native Colby Ralston (16), who was called up for two games last season, and Dodsland native Carson Dobson (15), who played one game for the Stars in 2017-18.

Returning forwards Luke Fennig, Shayde Peterson, and Tye Scherger were also at camp, although Dylan Esau was not.

The remaining forwards spots will be filled out during main camp, which will take place in August.

“We better see some battles at [main] camp,” Johnston said. “We’re going to do two practices. ‘A’ team is going to practice and then ‘B’ team is going to practice and then we’re going to have a game. Then we’re going to do in-house cleanup: school, do billets, do SHA, what’s a penalty, what’s not a penalty, we’ll talk about mental health. Do a two-day kind of camp with them.”

That camp will be held Aug. 18 to 19.

nathan.kanter@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @NathanKanter11