Quebec Major Junior Hockey League games have resumed in Quebec, Nova Scotia and P.E.I.
But New Brunswick teams are still benched due to COVID-19 restrictions.
There’s optimism that could change soon.
“We’re confident that the league may be able to negotiate something with the New Brunswick (Public Health),” says Sylvain Couturier, the general manager of the Acadie-Bathurst Titan, “but we’ll see.”
Currently, sports games in New Brunswick are prohibited in the province’s orange alert level of its COVID-19 recovery plan. Teams can only practise or run drills.
And officials aren’t ready to loosen restrictions just yet.
“Given the presence of new COVID-19 variants in the province, and the speed at which they spread, it’s unlikely that restrictions for sports will be relaxed in the near future,” says Bruce Macfarlane, a New Brunswick public health spokesperson.
The last time the Acadie-Bathurst Titan played a game was in late November.
A prolonged holiday break followed by a spike in COVID-19 cases in New Brunswick has kept them out of gameplay since.
Halifax, Charlottetown and Cape Breton teams have recently been allowed to resume action.
“It’s not up to us at the end of the day,” says Titan captain Mathieu Desgagnés. “We’re just hoping at this point… We’ll take anything at this point, we’re just excited to get going.”
“Right now we’re only focusing on what we can control,” he says. “We’re just going day by day and we’ll see what happens.”
Saint John Sea Dogs president and general manager Trevor Georgie says the league has been vigilant and cautious with COVID-19, but also creative in finding solutions to allow teams across the league back on the ice.
“For a lot of our players, they sacrificed a lot,” Georgie tells Global News. “This is a career for them. They have aspirations of reaching higher levels, having a career of playing hockey, or scholarships in university and different endeavours.”
Aside from the players, Georgie says the pandemic has been devastating to an organization that already has well-documented financial struggles.
“This team’s going, this year, due to the pandemic, we’ll be at seven-figure losses, which is staggering,” he says.
Couturier says they’re trying to keep the players busy with practice and training right now.
New Brunswick teams are on the QMJHL schedule for March, but they’d need a change in health protocols for that to happen.
The league says it’s status quo for now.
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