Panthers Rookies looking to rock the Wolves Friday night

Although there is hopefully a lot of summer yet to come, the VIJHL Exhbition season is almost upon us.  The Panthers will open the Regular Season on Friday night, September 6th however, the Club will see three exhibition games first.  All three will be against the Westshore Wolves.

This coming Friday, August 23rd the Panthers will host the Wolves in an all-rookie game starting at 7:30 pm.  Players signed from the April Camp including Denver Maloney, Matthew Seale, Sterling Lyon and Eric Horricks will be skating in the game.  Sixteen-year-old Luc Pelletier was signed however will be in Kelowna at the WHL's Rockets camp.  Other youngsters have been out on development ice with the "Cats" and for many of these hopefuls, the game will prove to be their first crack in Junior Hockey action.

The two Clubs will then head to the Q Centre in Colwood for an affair on August 28th before returning back to the Panorama on August 30th at 8:30 pm.  (Note the late start time).

"This coming Friday will see a lot of the players with wide eyes," explained GM Pete Zubersky.  "The final result is not that important but rather the chance for young players to take a step in their development.  The final two games will be very similar to the lineups that the two squads will head into the Regular Season.  We really like the group that we have put together and we would like to get out to a decent start, that's important.  A win in September is worth the same as wins in January and February and I think we understand that as a group.

Brad Tippett will be starting his 4th season as the Panthers' Bench Boss and will be joined by 2nd year Assistant Coach Jackson Skerratt.  Len Dawes, who is a familiar face on the Peninsula in the hockey community, will be an addition to the coachng staff and will be handling the duties with the defencemen.

Regular season pricing will be in effect for the two home exhibition tilts.