Reports from around MWJHL cities are that the league is now moving on from the Alpena Streetcats.
After the departure of the West Michigan Freeze, the MWJHL was down to seven potential teams. With the reports coming out of Alpena now concerning departure of the Alpena franchise, the league would then be down to six.
The questions remain though, does the MWJHL really have six franchises? Many people are doubting this idea. TJHN reported the choice of the West Michigan Freeze to go dark on September 11, 2014. The MWJHL took until September 16th, 2014 to address what was already known. Many question why it would take a full five days for the MWJHL to make an announcement when the owner of the franchise had already announced his choice to the league the week before and to TJHN.
In that release though the MWJHL says they have seven strong teams moving forward. That is strange considering the information coming from Alpena.
Last week, Igor Myaskovskiy Head Coach and Co-Owner of Alpena confirmed to TJHN that the Streetcats had three goaltenders and three skaters in Alpena preparing for the season. On top of that, TJHN is in possession of an email from Myaskovskiy that seeks to move his players to another team if he can receive the head coaching position with the receiving team.
On September 13, 2014 in a release by the Traverse City Hounds announcing the signing of Josh Smith, there was some well hidden information. In the very last paragraph the release states:
“In addition, the Hounds completed two trades this week, sending three players to the Michigan Ice Dogs in return for future considerations. Traverse City dealt the MWJHL playing rights to forwards Ethan Doyle and Cory Markovich and goaltender Bryce Goulah to the Ice Dogs.”
While on paper this may sound like good news for the Michigan Ice Dogs, no one can confirm that these players have reported to the Ice Dogs to play this season or if they will report. Unfortunately for the Ice Dogs, as well established junior franchise in the Detroit area, information provided to TJHN would have Ice Dogs roster at six or seven skaters the addition of these three players and six goalies.
Good news for Bloomington Blaze though as two Freeze players elected to stay close to home and report to the Blaze. This would give the Blaze just enough players to start the season with a fifteen man roster.
While TJHN would like to update our readers on the Berkley Bruins, we can not. No releases or reports have been made on their “camp” which was to have taken place this past weekend. Rumors in Detroit are that they are not close to having a team ready to take the ice.
The Soo Firehawks, Traverse City Hounds, and Detroit Fighting Irish are all said to be ready to go. Clearly though the rest of the league might not be as ready as some would like to report.
