Owen Sound HockeyFest (Image from Owen Sound website)
A new hockey event is coming to Owen Sound next month to carry on the spirit of Hockey Day in Canada.
The two-day event HockeyFest, set for Nov. 17 and 18 at the Bayshore Community Centre, is a grassroots project between Owen Sound Girls Hockey, Owen Sound District Secondary School, St. Mary’s Catholic School, the City of Owen Sound, and with the support of the University of Waterloo and York.
Leadership Teacher at OSDSS Katie Ferguson says as the Hockey Day in Canada event in Owen Sound last year was such a success, a number of organizations came together to put on this event. She says she and her husband were involved last year and were part of the planning for this new event. Her leadership class last year helped organize the puck toss event, which helped raise over $2,000 for the Salvation Army in Owen Sound.
“All of the feedback we got from the elementary schools and from the community was so positive from the Hockey Day in Canada from last year, that we wanted to think of a way that we could kind of bring that same spirit year after year, it was a nice way to get all the community involved. We had seniors coming, we have parents of players, we had elementary schools, we had both the entire high school populations together in one arena. I have gone to a lot of Attack games in my 36-years of living and I have never heard the Bayshore that loud as it was during the boys and girls games. It was just a really cool atmosphere that we want to recreate,” says Ferguson.
Festivities will start on Nov. 17 with both the University of Waterloo Warriors and the York University Lions women’s hockey teams on the ice. There will also be the high school boys and girls games between OSDSS and St. Mary’s.
That night will feature a number of on-ice clinics with the University of Waterloo ad York University teams as well as a panel for coaching, which will be moderated by Bayshore Broadcasting’s own Fred Wallace.
Owen Sound Director of Community Services Pamela Coulter says, “the on ice clinics will be skill focused, the university athletes will deliver them to the young players and then they will also have an opportunity to meet with those players off ice and ask them a little bit about how they got there by competing and balancing going to school.”
The following day, the Owen Sound Girls Ice Hawks will hit the ice from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.. Then at 2 p.m., the puck will drop for the game featuring the University of Waterloo Warriors against the York University Lions.
After the games, the streets of Owen Sound will come alive with the Kiwanis Santa Claus Parade with the Festival of Northern Lights in the River District to follow.
Children and youth will be invited to take part in organized road hockey along 2nd Avenue between 8th and 9th Street that night after the lights are turned on. Teams of four, between the ages of eight and 14, can sign up here.
Ferguson hopes to keep this new event around and the full schedule and tickets can be found on the HockeyFest website here.