Midget AAA Canes coaching staff takes shape
The Lethbridge midget AAA Hurricanes bench is solidfied as the team gears up for the 2018-19 season.
Taking the reins for the defending Alberta Midget Hockey League champion Hurricanes is former Lethbridge Val Matteotti bantam AAA Golden Hawks head coach Doug Paisley.
Paisley, who is also the president of the Western Hockey League’s Lethbridge Hurricanes, takes over the head coaching reins from Mike Dyck, who was announced as the new head coach of the Vancouver Giants of the WHL late last month.
Paisley returns to the midget AAA team that captured the AMHL title last winter and went on to win the bronze medal at the Telus Cup in Sudbury, Ont. at the end of April.
“Any time a team does as well and had the type of success they did, obviously finishing third in Canada at that level, those players will get a really long look at the junior level. So it’s on an unknown as to what you could get back,” said Paisley. “We’re really excited about it. I know the group relatively well. I know the 2001’s as well, I took a good look at those guys two years ago when I was the head coach of the AAA midgets.”
The new head coach has rounded out his bench with some assistants boasting some diverse backgrounds, a few of them moving up from Bantam AAA as well.
Joining Paisley behind the Canes bench are assistant coaches Ryan Aasman, Mitch Owsley, Josh Elliot, Brendan Harper and Tom Chapman as well as Athletic therapist Chris Chomyn
Aasman played four seasons with the University of Lethbridge Pronghorns men’s hockey team and enters his second year of coaching.
He played in 166 WHL games after being drafted eighth overall by the Prince Albert Raiders in the 2007 WHL bantam draft.
Owsley comes into his first year of coaching and played with the midget AAA Hurricanes from 2009-2011. He wore the captain’s ‘C’ in 2010-11.
Elliot comes into his fourth season of coaching after serving as the Golden Hawks video specialist last season. He also played four seasons with the Coaldale Copperheads of the Heritage Junior Hockey League.
Harper has four years of coaching under his belt after two seasons with the midget AA Hurricanes, who won the South Central Alberta Hockey League championship before losing in the provincial final, while Chapman brings six years of coaching experience and comes into his second stint with the program.
Rounding out the staff, Chomyn enters his third year with the program after working with the bantam AAA program and winning the SCAHL championship with the midget AA team.
He has worked two Alberta Cups and played three years with the Crowsnest Pass Timberwolves of the Alberta Junior Hockey League.
“We have a really diverse group of guys with different backgrounds,” said Paisley. “We’re looking forward to the year. We’ve been collaborating about what we can look like. There are some kids coming out of Medicine Hat as well that are some unknowns. But I know Ryan has some good ties, being from Medicine Hat.
“But the staff is extremely excited. We're chomping at the bit to get going and looking forward to it."
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