Tri City Icehawks (GLJHL, 2011-12)

2011-12 Regular Season: Icehawks vs. Wisconsin Rampage

     Here's a random program. I went to this game while my brother was still living in Bay City.

   The Tri City Icehawks are a junior hockey team based out of Bay City, Michigan. They play their home games at the Bay County Civic Arena. The team is owned by Arthur and Colleen Dore (Colleen is also General Manager). Chris Lacy was the head coach, with Eric Albrecht and Arthur Dore serving as his assistants.
     During the 2011-12 season, the Icehawks were part of the Great Lakes Junior Hockey League. That year, the Icehawks stumbled to a 10-32-0 record. The team scored 158 goals while allowing 288 on the year.
     This program is from the game on February 12, 2012, when the Icehawks played the Wisconsin Rampage. The Icehawks won, 4-3, in a shootout. At the time, this was their ninth win of the year.
     The Icehawks are considered a "Tier III" junior team, which would place them one step below the NAHL (where the Port Huron Fighting Falcons and Michigan Warriors once played, btw). Probably the lowest level of hockey I've watched (outside of my brother's house league games). I believe tickets were $4, about the price of high school sports. The lady taking tickets (Colleen Dore, maybe?) seemed genuinely surprised that my brother and I came to watch the game, especially when I said where I was from. Very welcoming too, may I add. The hockey game wasn't too bad, either.
     The program is on the same level as something you'd find at, say, Deckerville High School athletic events. It's a 15-page program with advertisements (most of them pixelated), all of which are in color. Individual pictures of the players, coaching staff and front office are on the middle pages. The majority of the players from that season were from the Tri-City area, but one was from the Czech Republic! Local ads include Firehouse Soft Car Wash, Ken Wackerle Excavating and Winding Creek Boarding Kennels. BTW, the Icehawks logo on the front is pretty slick.

Aftermath: The Icehawks still exist, and still play at the Bay County Civic Arena. However, they currently play in the United States Premier Hockey League, another Tier III circuit. As of this post, the Icehawks have a 13-1-1 record, tops in the Eastern Conference of the Midwest Region. The Dore family still owns the franchise.

Resources:

US Premier Hockey League Standings

Tri City Icehawks Official Website

2011-12 Tri City Icehawks Regular Season Scores

Comments

Port Huron Hockey: Flags/Wings (1962-81)

Now, on to Port Huron. Port Huron has had a long, yet checkered, history of pro hockey. The most successful franchise, by far, was the Port Huron Flags (also called Wings for a few years) of the IHL. The Flags were, for the most part, a competitve team on the ice, making the Turner Cup Finals seven times and winning the Cup on three occasions. For three years, (1971-74), the franchise was a farm team of the Detroit Red Wings, and sent numerous players on to the NHL in it's existence. However, the team had problems drawing big enough crowds. While the Flags lasted for nearly 20 years, former GM Morris Snider later admitted that the franchise could have folded three years before it actually did, due to declining attendance. I've found some Flags/Wings programs online over the years, and here's what I have. 1963-64 Regular Season--Flags vs. Windsor 1963-64 was the second year of existence for the Flags. After missing the playoffs in their inaugural cam

Flint Generals yearbook (IHL, 1973-74)

I recently bought two yearbooks from the Flint Generals of the IHL. This one is from the 1973-74 season. It's a 40-page book, all in black-and-white, and on glossy paper. Each player for that season has a full page photo and a short bio. The statistics and a team photo for each Generals season are included. Stats for every player that wore the "blue and gold" are listed in the back of the yearbook. Flint Journal sportswriter Len Hoyes added an article previewing the remainder of the 1973-74 campaign. One thing that Hoyes noted in his article was about attendance: "With all of their problems, the Generals were still attracting fans at a rate of 3,950 per game. Attendance was down slightly, but Flint's percentage rate of almost 100 percent remained the envy of minor league hockey." (Hoyes, 1974) The original Generals were a popular team for most of their existence, and attendance only bottomed out when the region's economy tanked

Muskegon Mohawks (IHL, 1965-84)

I know, I said earlier I was going to look at Detroit's minor league teams. That would mean the Vipers would be next, but I decided to cover them later when I had time (I have a TON of programs from that team). Instead, I'm going to look briefly at Muskegon. Muskegon has had a long, colorful past in professional hockey. It all started in 1960 with the expansion Muskegon Zephyrs of the IHL. Five seasons later, 1965-66, the Zephyrs became the Mohawks, and remain so until 1984-85, when they became the Lumberjacks. The Lumberjacks would remain in town through the 1992-93 season. After that season, the franchise would relocate to Cleveland, Ohio. Here are the Mohawks programs I have, along with a couple bonus scans. The Mohawks existed from 1965-84, about 20 seasons, and had two vastly different eras of success. From 1965-76, the Mohawks finished above .500 10 times, winning the Huber Trophy (Regular Season Championship) six times and the Turner Cup (Playoff C

Hockey Programs

Search This Blog