Camp Preview: Melville Millionaires

Melville Stadium's home to Mils' training camp this Friday to Sunday. Coach and GM Jamie Fiesel has the details.

CS: Coach, you had a huge spring camp during last year's playoffs, can we expect anywhere near that amount this weekend?

Jamie Fiesel: Not at all actually Craig. We use the spring camp to evaluate players and see who we need to bring in for main camp. You just can't deal with that many guys for main camp and expect to get down in numbers with our timeline. We're going to bring in between 60 or 70 guys, that's 4 teams, and get right to it.

CS: And is it all guys that can play this year, or do you bring in any recently listed '92s and '93s?

JF: We do. We have our listed guys coming in and a few younger guys, and a few hometown guys who'll have to play in the Blue and White game, they'll be the future Millionaires, they'll be here as well, but most of the guys are coming in and trying to make the team this year and that's what you need, you need competition for the positions, we do have a lot of veterans coming back, but there's always spots available and you need to push those vets to make them better.

CS: A lot of forwards graduated from last year's team (Campbell, Johnston, Dyke, Hennings, Shudo, Wilson), most of which are going on to post-secondary or pro, but you look at guys who saw some spot duty for you last year (Cody Hanson, Lance Herauf, Tyler Murray, Tyson Melnychuk), maybe there aren't a whole lot of spots left up front if those guys can make it.

JF: We do have a total of 16 now returning and that's a good base for a team. We do have holes to fill as far as some high-end forwards from last year, but we think we do have some guys already, Lind, Hope, Decorby and Dolinski are all back, and those guys were some of our top players in the second half of the year and in the playoffs for us. I heard around the league the rumour is we're not gonna be that good, but that's a good position to be in, we've been there before as the underdog and we think we're positioned a lot better than other people do right now.

CS: Any guys that are in Western League camps that may be coming back, a guy like Cody Hanson who played a game with you late last year, he's in Regina Pats camp is he?

JF: He is, and we're going to have to see how that plays out. With the coaching change in Regina he feels he's got a better chance to showcase himself, and that's good for him, we always want our players to play at the highest level. But Cody has indicated to us that if it doesn't work out in the WHL that he'd feel good about coming to our organization, so that's just a wait-and-see. Matt Kinnunen went to Lethbridge camp, he's in contact with us, he's going to let us know, we do expect him back. We were in total agreement with him going there, you always want to play with the best players and give it a shot, so Matt's there. Taylor Jordan, we thought was going to Portland, and to our surprise, he called last week and he's foregoing that and he's coming straight here, so there's a guy we actually didn't get contact with during the summer and we thought he maybe wasn't interested in us anymore, but now he's coming to our camp so that's exciting as well.

CS: And that's Michael's cousin?

JF: It is Michael's cousin, he's a little taller than Michael, they'll be a couple trees, maybe we should put them on the same line together. (Michael's 6'4", 213 / Tayler's 6'6", 171)














CS: No kiddin'. Camp gets going Friday, what's the schedule?

JF: We're going to have registration between 11:00 and 1:00, and then we're going to get going with ice sessions right at 2:00. We're going to break down into four teams, have a couple games at 2:00 and 3:15 and go again for a night session. If people want to come out and see what's happening for main camp and start getting that hockey itch, they're certainly welcome.

I want to mention one more thing Craig, we too have our season tickets available here on Saturday at rink from 10:00 to 4:00. And if you want to pick up your season tickets between 11:00 and 2:00, we'll even throw in a hot dog and a drink for free. So free lunch with your purchase of season tickets. I just want to let everyone know that's where you can get your tickets, 10:00 to 4:00, Saturday during our camp.