High Prairie Red Wings Join New League

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The High Prairie Red Wings have left the GMHL and are now part of a new league called the National Junior Hockey League.

Team owner and GM Kevin Hopfner says they had some issues with how the GMHL operated.

“We did pay a substantial amount of money to be a part of that league, however we thought we weren’t getting enough value for the amount that we were paying and we had some issues with how things were run and we just wanted to address them and unfortunately they wouldn’t look at any of our issues. We just decided to step away and start our own league in Alberta.”

The new league consists of the teams that were previously in the GMHL’s West Division.

Despite the change in leagues, Hopfner says things are still mostly “business as usual”.

“Our recruitment process is still the same. The competition level I believe will be quite a bit better. We’re not controlled by the amount of players that we can sign and the quality of players we can sign and trades going forward will just be done within our new league.”

You can hear our full interview with Hopfner below.

– Kyle Moore, Trending 55 Newsroom