How long do you think it should take to get from Winnipeg to Manchester?
Chances are, your guess won’t be high enough to match the hours the Manitoba Bisons men’s hockey team will be spending to get to the UK for their preseason barnstorming tour.
“We have three flights,” said Bisons captain Brett Stovin before their journey began Sunday morning.
“We have some connecting ones, but it’ll end up being about a 23-hour travel day … We fly to Toronto, then St. John’s, then to Dublin, then we have to take a bus and a ferry over to Manchester. That adds quite a bit to it.”
The team better make sure to catch some shut-eye on the trip because they won’t have much time to shake off the jet lag before they hit the ice: a matchup with the Manchester Storm Wednesday night local time awaits.
The Bisons will play a total of four games against teams from the Elite Ice Hockey League, the top league in the United Kingdom. They face the Fife Flyers Thursday before playing back-to-back games against the Belfast Giants over the weekend.
This is the second year the Bisons have crossed the pond for some preseason puck. Stovin wasn’t able to play last year, brought over in a coaching role as he was coming off hip surgery, but he still saw first-hand the impact an overseas trip can have on team chemistry.
“It was unbelievable. The stories from the nights out, we do have some fun as well. It is mostly about the hockey but we do some team bonding. This year we’re doing the Game of Thrones tour one day that everyone’s super excited about. We’re going to do some golf tournaments,” Stovin said.
“This year we have 12 rookies, only five veterans going overseas so it’s going to be a big opportunity for us to bond with the young guys.”
Not only is this a bonding opportunity, it’s also a quasi-audition for Stovin and other graduating players like Kamerin Nault and Byron Spriggs as they look to their hockey future.
“We’re very, very interested in trying to earn a job over there for the following season. We’re in talks with agents right now so this is kind of our shot for them to see us face-to-face, meet the organizations and see what it’s about.
“You have a good showing, maybe they’ll pay attention to you all year and hopefully you have a good year and you get a chance to go over there.”
Stovin admitted he didn’t know much about hockey in the UK until last year’s trip, but said he was very impressed with the way players are treated overseas.
“Every game we played over there was sold out or close to sold out. It’s an interesting crowd, it’s a lot different than North America. It’s kind of a soccer style. They have chants going all game and they’re into it. It’s loud throughout the entire game no matter what’s going on on the ice.”
Stovin said his teammates loved the UK tour last year, playing on wide open ice against pros in front of rowdy fans, so it was a no-brainer to raise money to pay for this year’s trip.
“It comes completely out of the players’ pockets, so earlier this year we held a golf tournament, kind of an alumni tournament. We had some big corporate sponsors help us out a ton. That ended up raising about $19,000.
“From there, the university fund-raised a little bit to help us out, made it about halfway for all the guys and we have to pay for the other half.”
Their opponents are helping out too, pitching in for hotels and game-day meals.
It’s a whirlwind tour, four games in less than a week that will leave the players exhausted, but it’s an experience they’ll be talking about for the rest of their lives.