New era for junior A Lakers gets put on hold

What was to be the start of a new era for the Peterborough Merit Precision Junior A Lakers has been put on hold. The Ontario Junior A Lacrosse League cancelled its 2020 season following a meeting Thursday night.

It means none of Peterborough’s senior or junior lacrosse teams will play this season because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Century 21 Lakers captain Robert Hope was hired during the winter to take over as head coach for a junior A team that has missed the playoffs four consecutive years. Hope assembled a new staff and started workouts in Millbrook through the winter and up until lacrosse activity was suspended in March.

“It’s very disappointing. We were very eager to get started with a new coaching staff with new ideas,” Hope said. “We were excited to get some eyes on the players we did not get to see in our short winter sessions.

“The unknown is what is going to happen down the road? How is this break going to affect lacrosse from junior to senior to pro?”

It remains to be seen how teams will be affected financially, how sponsors will be impacted and whether fans will return in numbers, all factors that take a back seat to health and safety, he said.

“Hopefully we can come back bigger and better than what it was but that’s a very unknown thing,” Hope said.

Hope was taking over a team that’s assembled some young talent and appeared ready to take a step forward.

“For any team things don’t change overnight,” he said.

“It’s a process we wanted to put in place starting in year one and moving to year two,” Hope added. “With this year being a wash it’s going to be a long wait.

“Hopefully we can be as productive as possible with the time and reach out to players and communicate with them about what the future is going to look like. Hopefully we’ll be as prepared as possible when things do get going,” he said.

If some social distancing restrictions for sports are eased later this summer, perhaps there will be a chance to get players together, he said.

“Everyone is very eager to play and coach. We miss lacrosse a lot, every aspect of it,” Hope said.

“We are making sure we follow what has been put in place by our health unit. If things continue to get better and look like they are going in the right direction, hopefully we can have some sort of practice or shoot around.”