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352 ba oe, 3 : "an RUSSELL MIDGETS 1957 These young players will be recognized by many fans who were following minor hockey in the mid-fifties. This midget team was probably the finest to operate out of this area. Back row left to right: Don McLaren, Ron Gamble, Jacques Loiselle, Bert Morrow and Bill Linegar.' Middle row left to right: Glen Millar (coach), Leo Gignac, Wayne Rombough, Germain Cousineau, Bruce Loucks and J. Payetee. Front row left to right: Dennis Rowan, Robert Martel, Jean Guy Martel, Jim Walker and Claude Labelle. Metcalfe Figure Skating News With ninety-one members registered in the Club the 1979-80 season is off to an excellent start. Already the Club Executive has been working for the future. The Club, under the direction of in- structor Bev Meikle of Edwards, has four levels ranging from beginners to seniors. Lessons take place every Monday evening at the Metcalfe arena. A crafts booth operated at the Metcalfe Fair pro- ved successful and members are now selling pens in an effort to raise money to help pay operating costs. On Dec. 8th' the Club will hold a bake sale at the Metcalfe Community Centre and it certain- ly would appreciate the support of everyone. Members of the Executive are: President, Pat Berman; Vice- Pres., Carol Budarick; Sec., Sharyn Heagle; Treas., Joyce Dooley. --other Business approve: election of officers. tors, 4. RUSSELL RECREATION ASSOCIATION _ ANNUAL GENERAL MEMBERSHIP MEETING November 20, 1979 8:00 p.m. Dr. F. Kinnaird Com. Centre The purpose of the meeting is to-consider: --The Chairperson's Report --The Treasurer's Report --Amendments To The Constitution --The Minutes of the last Annual General Membership Meeting of November 20, 1978, as published and hold the Nominations are requested for the following positions: Chairman; Vice-Chairman; Treasurer; Secretary; Direc- = Jack Mcldren SPORTS TALK The New York Islanders are ina must-win situation this season. For the eight-year-old hockey , , team, the pressure is on. Most teams that young would be in the cellar of their division but not the Isles. They were destined towards success. After a hapless first season in which the New Yorkers set the kind of records no one likes to have, the Islanders improved in their second season by cutting down their goals against. Many teams would like to have Islander manager Bill Torrey for their club. Torrey is said to be one of if not the best hockey manager today. Along came Denis Potvin, then Bryan Trottier. In their third season the Isles knocked of the Rangers in the best of three preliminary round and the hockey world was shocked. After falling behind three games to nine, the Isles roared back to beat the Pen- guins 4-3. They proceeded to do the same to the Flyers losing the first three contests, but won the next three games to tie up the series. The Flyers proved to be too much in the Spectrum but New York got itself a name in hockey circles. The Islanders kept improving with superb draft choices obtain- ing Mike Bossy, an instant hit. In his first two seasons, he has scored 53 and 69 goals respectively, and won rookie-of-the-year-honors. New York has won the last two division crowns. They won their first round quarter-final series last year but that's where they stalled. The Rangers dumped their crosstown rivals last spring. Islander -fans are getting impa- tient. -The Islanders know how to do it in the season but not in the playoffs. The big scoring line was almost non-existent last playoff season. Things have to change. If the™ Islanders don't win the Cup this year, it might be all over for coach Al Arbour. New York has started off slow this season but things will or better start to pick up. There is nothing worse than 20 disgruntled players on. the ice. KKK KKK KK What a way to go out of the 1979 CFL season! I'm talking about the B.C. Lions. At -one time, the Lions were supporting a 9-2-1 fecord. They were in the running for first place. B.C. fell apart losing their final four games and being relegated to third place in the WFC. The Lions ranks were depleted through. numerous injuries. Had the Lions been healthy, the result might have been a little closer. Calgary does deserve credit, especially coach Jack Gotta. Got- ta has one of the best defences in the country. When "Jocko'" was with Ottawa, he was noted with one of the best clubs in Canada. Now he has done it with the Stamps. Ken Johnston played ex- ceptionally well. The only bright spot for B.C. was Lou Passaglia who punted magnificantly. So, it's the Stampeders and the Edmonton Eskimos in the Western final, an all-Alberta final. It will be one of the best games of the season. In rating the defences, they are pretty equal. Edmonton has the best offence in the country. I'll predict the Eskies in a close one by about three « points, 24-21. 2 RR KK By Garey Ris For the seventh consecutive year, it'll be the Ottawa Rough Riders and the Montreal Allouet- tes in the Eatern Final, this year to be played at the Big Owe in Mon- treal. Once again, this could be Ot- tawa's downfall. The Riders have only won in the Olympic Stadium once in about eight appearances. Things have got to change. Ot- tawa cannot fall behind early. They'll have to rely on the passing game. In the game last week Ot- tawa gained a mere 37 yards. The only way Brancato and his boys will go to the Grey Cup is via the pass route. Ottawa has many outstanding receivers in the Gabe, Martin, Cox, Jeff Avery, 'and a _few others. If Condredge Holloway stays healthy. and doesn't get zonked very much, Ottawa has a chance. The defence led by Mike Nelms and Mike Fannuci and a slew of others must contain David Greens Joe Barnes must be gotten to ear- "ly. If the Riders can do all this and stay relatively injury-free, Ottawa could win. 9 2 2 9 2k As 2k 2 2 Quite a turnaround in. the Russell Minor System. The Russell Atom "B" team is playing extremely well. After going through last season with only one tie and one win (by default), the team is starting to look respec- table. After five games, the team is supporting a 2-1-2 record. Team captain Richard Ris has already four goals. The team is looking better all the time. Who knows, maybe they'll go all the way this year! Games are held every Friday at the Dr. F.A. Kinnaird Com- munity Centre at 7:00 p.m. Sup- port Russell Minor Hockey! Sports Ramblings More Hockey Studies Back in March or April I received achockey questionnaire in the mail which basically was enquiring about the quality of minor hockey. The survey was sent to parents of minor hockey league players and was conducted by the Ontario Hockey Council, a body funded by the provincial government. My first reaction was to treat it as just another worthless survey and to toss it in the garbage can. A quick scan of the question- naire soon aroused my interest and before long I had com- pleted it and soon had it heading back to place of origin. It disturbed me just a bit because it was fairly obvious that the body would get the answers it wanted (from most parents) because of the method and the type of questions posed. So why go to the expense of a survey? What is it going to tell us we don't already know? As it turns out the survey has aroused a great deal of interest among hockey people. The results have now been completed and officials from the Hockey Council are holding public meetings throughout the province to discuss the pros and cons of the survey and in * general to allow parents to air their criticisms regarding minor hockey. The session held recently in Ottawa was apparently a lively one with many of those in attendance being critical of the questionnaire. Despite all the surveys, all the public meetings and all the corridor coffee break sessions we still haven't come up with any concrete methods of improving minor hockey in this country. Ever since the time teams from the Soviet Union demonstrated they could play the game as good and many times superior to our teams, we have been run- ning in circles trying to determine what is wrong in our minor hockey system. First they told us there was too much violence in our minor hockey system, so body contact at the Pee Wee level and below has been eliminated. They are continually looking for rule changes which will further reduce violence hoping this will cure all the ills and once again put us back on top. In fact there is very little violence in minor hockey (midget included) even at the most-competitive level. The few occa- sions it does surface, it can usually be attributed to poor of- ficiating. We certainly don't need any further rule changes--leave the competitiveness and good clean body checking in the game. If you have looked at an official rule book lately you will find that every possible infraction is covered--all the officials have to do is enforce them. Seeming- ly, there are officials who simply refuse to do this, who why in- troduce additional ones. If we are to improve our game we need better coaching techniques and better off-ice condition- ing programs. It doesn't make much sense to me that minor hockey organizations, paying as much as $45 per hour for icetime, will spend half the time running conditioning drills when better results can be achieved off the ice at no cost to anyone. Some coaches will insist on scrimmaging during practice sessions with a few players actually sitting on the players' bench getting absolutely nothing out of the allotted time. Expensive ice time should be used to improve hockey skills, learn the basics and above all to teach young players the proper technique of skating. It is in these areas we need improvement--what we don't need is more rule changes or more expensive studies. Leafs Upset It is fairly abvious that a number of Toronto Maple Leaf hockey players have become complacent and don't really ap- preciate their new General Manager Punch Imlach telling it like it really is. For the past few years we have watched Leaf teams do nothing more than go through the motions on a number of occasions. Now Punch is attempting to shake them' up and they don't like it one little bit. Toronto fans have been _ extremely patient with their heroes, more so than any other Canadian city would have been. In the past the coach and general manager have been blamed for the teams failure but it is about time the players accept their share of responsibility. The fact is the majority of them are just mediocre. Even the superstars like Sittler, MacDonald and Salming could be slow- ing down a bit. The Leafs are in for shake-up. It's about time. GORD'S SKATE SHARPENING TEL 4A5-5541 PROFESSIONAL SKATE CARE CENTER CUSTOM RADIUS) RUSSELL ARENA | Mon.-Fri. 7-10 p.m. Sat.-Sun. 9-2:30 p.m. bitte