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Hockey idle in Morley

“Hockey in Morley is at a standstill.” And with that utterance, Alberta Treaty Hockey Association president Marty Wildman left one sports reporter scratching his head.
Alberta Treaty Hockey Association president Marty Wildman is pumped about the Alberta Treaty Hockey Championships coming to Cochrane. He’s not so pumped about the
Alberta Treaty Hockey Association president Marty Wildman is pumped about the Alberta Treaty Hockey Championships coming to Cochrane. He’s not so pumped about the Stoney Nakoda rink in Morley going idle this season.

“Hockey in Morley is at a standstill.”

And with that utterance, Alberta Treaty Hockey Association president Marty Wildman left one sports reporter scratching his head.

Following a successful reintroduction of organized hockey in the Foothills Recreational Hockey League last season, the Stoney Nakoda Nation rink in Morley went dark this season; a grey, ice-less concrete floor where kids had been skating daily last season.

“There was a lot of internal conflicts and stuff like that that happened that kind of left things sitting idle, in a sense,” said Wildman, a Morley resident who got the program up and running at the beginning of the 2011-12 season.

No need to ask why. Increasingly, it all boils down to the same thing.

“From what I was told, there was no money to run any sort of program there,” Wildman offered.

The result was equally predictable.

“It crushed a lot of the little kids’ hearts.”

The net benefit of organized hockey in Morley last season could not be overstated.

“It did bring a positive impact to the community. In the townsite area and stuff, vandalism, crime, and all that, was going down because the kids had something to do,” Wildman related. “They had a healthy way of getting rid of a lot of this energy they have.”

As for the reasons, other than funding, behind the decision to idle the Morley rink this season?

“That’s not for me to comment,” Wildman said. “We have leadership in there that are in there to work on stuff like that. It’s just a shame they couldn’t get together and work on something like this.

“I did try. I’ve worked closely with Chiniki Chief Labelle to try and get some things going. As you know out there, it takes three chiefs to agree. Not just one.”

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