Large number of hopefuls vying for a spot with Wellesley Applejacks
Coach praises work of GM and scouts in recruiting prospects; Wellesley still has a lot of paring down to do
HOCKEY HOPEFULS FILLED THE St. Clements arena this week vying for a spot on the Wellesley Applejacks’ 2015-16 roster.
“Our numbers are close to 60. That’s pretty good compared to other years,” head coach Brad Gerber said. “Our scouting staff has done a tremendous job in recruiting the players for us.”
He notes the Junior C team is still waiting on some late cuts from Junior B teams. It’ll be another 10 to 14 days before they complete their roster, giving players the chance to show what they’ve got at an exhibition game this Sunday in St. Clements.
“We’re very pleased with the turnout. Obviously our GM and scouts, they’ve done their job and it’s good to see such a good turnout to camp, that’s for sure. Especially, it’s nice to see so many local kids as well,” Gerber said.
He says every time they hit the ice they’ll make a few more decisions.
They’ve spent five nights at the Elmira Sugar Kings camp watching and pick- ing up some players for the Jacks, with the support of Elmira management.
“Jeff Snyder and Kevin Bloch have been tremendous for us. They’ve sent players our way,” Gerber said. “Actually we signed a couple guys that they released last night. They’re good players. They’re late cuts for the Kings so they obviously will help us. The Kings, they’ve been doing really good work for us and we’re really pleased with the players they sent our way.”
They just signed Tyson Bender from Elmira and Garrett Shultz from Waterloo.
He said they did well in the Kings camp and they were more than happy to scoop them up when they became available.
Returning players include Cal Jefferies, Justin Lebold, and Sean McEwan. The Midland Flyers picked up former Wellesley players Matt Schieck and Tim Bester this summer.
Gerber says the veterans won’t likely be playing the exhibition game.
“Obviously we want to play the new guys, see what they can do for us,” Gerber said. “Our numbers are still going to be pretty large when we play on Sunday. So we will have guys that will play for us this year that won’t be playing on Sunday. We want to see the players that we haven’t seen as much, give them a chance, they can show us what they can do, and we’ll make deci- sions from there.”
He notes the team will be quite young this year, with quite a few 17- and 18-yearolds. But, the coaching staff feels they can play in the league and once they get used to the pace of the game they’ll be just fine.
“We’ve worked hard all summer and we knew that’s one thing we had to do was get out and advertise our team and get the local talent and kids from around the area out to try out. So far the hard work’s paid off,” Gerber said.
The Applejacks host the Mitchell Hawks at the St. Clements arena for an exhibition game on August 30. The puck drops at 2:30 p.m. Their opening game will be in Woodstock on September 18 at 7:45 p.m. Their first official home game will be October 10 at 7:30 p.m. at the Wellesley Arena versus New Hamburg.