Last December, Crescent Point Place, home of the Weyburn Red Wings, experienced an ammonia leak that shut the rink down for the last weeks of the 2024 regular season. It was the town of Assiniboia that opened the doors of their Southland Co-op Centre to the Red Wings during this time.
Thanks to their generosity, the Red Wing were able to continue in the regular season without a hitch, bringing them to where they are now – at the top of the Viterra Division and playing in the final series of the Canterra Seeds Cup.
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Weyburn invited the council and staff for the town of Assiniboia to game three of the final series, hosted at CPP last night. Weyburn Mayor Jeff Richards says the invitation was a way to say, “thank you”.
“We were grateful back in December when we had the troubles with our rink, that the community of Assinboia was a gracious host to our team for those games. And they reached out and they housed all the Red Wing players and they found billets right away and they gave up their rink for us and for our team. So we wanted to say, you know what, we're here for you too.”
Recreation and Community Wellness Manager for the town, Steph VanDeSype, says they were glad to host the team.
“We were so fortunate to host the Weyburn Red Wings as their temporary home before Christmas and we just, we really made it work. We shifted things around to accommodate ice times and we found billets for all the guys and Weyburn in turn said, ‘hey, thank you for your support. We'd love to have you back for a playoff game’.”
They were stationed in the nest with Weyburn city councillors taking in the action. VanDeSype expresses her enjoyment despite the result.
“We're thrilled to be here and cheering the guys on. We were hoping for a win tonight, but that's okay. They gave us a really good game to watch. It was really good and looking out into the stands, we've seen lots of the Assiniboia fans so Weyburn has definitely got a new fan base this year.”
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Richards shares her sentiment, saying the communities have become closer as a result.
“Hockey's a tight community particularly in Southern Saskatchewan is a tight community and we kind of look at it as when you're getting work done in your house, you go and stay with your family and that's kind of how we looked at this.”