By Michael Boriero
Local Journalism Initiative
After Quebec prohibited all indoor sports and activities until at least Jan. 17, Hockey Sherbrooke General Manager Stéphane Dion began monitoring the situation closely, as the government’s latest lockdown eats into the regular season.
“We hope to have news next weekend from the government, our federation, and public health to know if we’ll be able to restart our activities in a gradual fashion, kind of like in 2021,” Dion said in a phone interview, adding that he supports a pause given the number of cases.
Although there is a lot of speculation, Dion said there hasn’t been any word regarding the resumption of sports. The government’s lockdown and curfew announcement was made last week just before New Year’s Eve, so everyone is still in a wait-and-see mode.
“We have an event, a tournament, that starts on Jan. 20 and undoubtedly at the end of the week we’ll have an orientation regarding the event to see whether we cancel it completely or if we wait again for next week,” said Dion. The federation plans to take it week-by-week.
According to Dion, he hasn’t received many messages from parents yet. The office was closed for the holiday break, he explained, but he expects it will start to pick up by next weekend. The parents will want to know what will happen to the season, he continued.
Dion told The Record that he had high hopes for teams in the federation to return to the ice following the annual two-week break during Christmas time. But the prolonged pause initiated by Quebec has thrown a giant wrench in the regular season schedule.
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