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On behalf of our member teams in the Central Division, welcome to the 2008-2009 hockey season. This promises to be an exciting year of hockey with a fresh new approach in the way we do things on the ice and in our front offices. This past spring a handful of team owners and the leadership of the Ontario Hockey Association decided there was a need to try something new in OHA Junior A Hockey as a pilot project.
Courageously this group worked together to get to this, our collective opening days of the season. In this pilot some of the changes are visible like shorter benches (19 players on the game vs. 20 for regular OPJHL teams) – some of those are things happening in the front offices of each team and divisional leadership in terms of accounting, professionalism and a league-first attitude to player development, promotion and advancing players to the next levels of hockey: OHL/CHL, NCAA, CIS and professional.
There will be a number of initiatives underway to advance the way our game is played and special events to showcase our players. We have entered in to agreements to broaden our players exposure and provide a solid education foundation. We have partnered with Cardinal Sports Management who will be running our education programs and school preparation programs. We have reached out to technology partners to be able to webcast our games across the world on the Internet. We have broadcast partners in RogersTV who will be broadcasting games from Newmarket, Toronto and at St. Michael’s all season long. There’s much more to come in the days ahead. We are glad to have you on board with us. Stay tuned and enjoy tonight’s and every game this season in the Central Division.
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