It’s an exciting week as the Nipissing varsity women’s hockey team prepares for homecoming weekend.
The girls will be the feature attraction on Saturday night at Memorial Gardens as they take on the Laurentian Voyageurs.
“This is the first time we get to be in the big game on Saturday and it is going to be great for our local players because obviously there is going to be a lot of local people at the game but it is also great for our entire team because we have never had that opportunity because the men have always been in town to play that game,” said Darren Turcotte, Nipissing Lakers varsity women's head coach.
“It will probably be one of the biggest crowds they have ever played in front of.”
Turcotte has not had to travel too far from home to bring in top-end talent. The former NHLer and former Ice Boltz coach has been able to find a lot of local talent coming through the Ice Boltz pipeline.
The 2019 locals with Ice Boltz ties include Teagan Feltz, Melanie Young, MacKenzie McMahon and Malory Dominico.
They join locals Maria Dominico and Danika Ranger on a Lakers team that has now brought in close to 20 local Ice Boltz into the program since its inception in 2013.
“It is something that we always do is try to find local talent and given the opportunity if they want to stay in North Bay and go to Nipissing we give them that opportunity and we have been pretty fortunate to have some great players that have played for us in the past that were from the Ice Boltz program,” said Turcotte after a Wednesday morning practice.
“This year we have six former Ice Boltz playing with us so.”
Turcotte says his connection to the program helps and he sees a lot of benefits for future Ice Boltz to follow that path.
“Once they are here they are able to have the luxury of being able to go to school and stay at home,” he said.
“Players want to play for a winning program and they want to play with good players so this year we have some excellent recruits coming in and it has been able to help us for future years.”
Turcotte says they are always looking at Ice Boltz players to join the Lakers program and he hopes that when the time comes they make the decision to follow the trend.
