Submitted: Blaine Moroz PRAIRIE FOOTBALL LEAGUE is Westman's First Non-Contact Flag Football League for both girls and boys ages 8-13 and adults over 18. Youth Divisions are 8-9, 10-11, and 12-13. Adult Divisions are Men's and Co-ed Divisions (certain ratio rules apply to Co-ed teams to ensure fairness for all teams) Co-ed Games and youth League practices are Monday evenings. (parents can play on a team and get some much needed "adult time"  while their child practices on the field beside them if they choose to play) Men's Division and youth league games are Wednesday evenings. NO WEEKENDS EVER!! We are all learning the specific rules and will be playing the Football Canada National 5V5 Flag Football Program. Full rules can be found on Football Canada's website. This game is shortlisted as an Olympic Trial event and we want everyone to learn the right format and rules right off the start so we can progress under the same rules and hopefully send some of our young athletes to compete for these in the future. Your child's safety is always first and foremost, and we are happy to say our equipment is far and above what is required by Football Manitoba or Football Canada. Before I go any further, as a community volunteer in Brandon for over 15 years and the inaugural winner of the Brandon Sun Community Leader Award for Coaching, I want to express a heart felt thanks to anyone and everyone who works with the youth of this great community, in any way, as they truly are our most valuable asset in the community for the future. I lean on this experience to say that we watched and listened to parents over the years and have a new/ old take on youth sports for this community. This is not in any way meant to upset or anger any leagues or people involved. This is a general issue with more than one sport in our area and no offence is meant to anyone. How many families with kids are frustrated with certain aspects of youth sports in our area? Lack of proper organization, lack of availability to deal with parent concerns and complaints, individual agendas and lack of teamwork in Boardrooms, lack of trained coaches to properly teach the rules and protocols of the game our children play, inequity in playing time when everyone pays the same amount to participate, and kids and parents dreading and hoping at the same time that they are on so and so's team and hope they wont be on so and so's team or have so and so for a coach, for numerous reasons. (kids don't get along with each other, parents don't get along with each other or have past issues with some involved, etc). Well so are WE!! I have sat through numerous youth drafts where kids get picked to be on teams for how calm the stands will be and who the parents are. Youth sports should ALWAYS be about the kids and NEVER about the parents or politics. We are the Prairie Football League and we are offering and "old school" take on youth sports in Brandon. Our League starts with over 120 years combined experience in every aspect of running leagues. Our experience comes from 6 different sports in Brandon, (hockey, soccer, baseball, softball, rugby, and football) and ranges from  Grass roots to provincial and national level Coaches and Officials, Community leaders in organizing and bringing sporting events to Brandon, and sideline support programs for parents and players clarification and transparency. We are all still actively involved in sports in the Brandon area. Best of all, none of us have any kids in the league so we can truly say the rules of PFL are set for everybody, not just somebody. We are a Fair Play league. Our B of D slogan is "We are Directors, we are not Directed", that means that we value everyone's opinions and ideas in the room, as all it does is make the league better.  We are committed to your child having the best experience they can through youth sports. Gone are the days when teams grew and bonded together through community area teams, (like smaller towns), kids would practice their sports daily at recess at school and seek to get together to practice at local parks and community green spaces. This is not the case anymore as most teams have an open draft concept to make things "fair" and create a level field for all people to abide by. We are old enough to have coached and lived through the concept of eliminating community center and neighborhood teams, and at the time the purpose for it made sense. We wanted to get our kids exposed to different styles of coaching and meet new kids every year and build social skills outside our respective community region. This was working well up to about 7-8 years ago when technology took full force of social skills and interpersonal communications and actually made things worse for youth in some cases. "Forcing" people together through an open draft who may have past unresolved conflicts, or children who for whatever reasons don't get along with other team mates or their coaches are "stuck" with no out on this scenario, and this is after you have paid your hard earned money to have your child participate in whatever sport you choose. Its YOUR money so why not at least have a say or chance to have a say in how much your child enjoys youth sports, and we are putting that option back in the hands of the parents and kids to eliminate politics and tension before we even begin the season of play. Have a group of girls and/ or boys the same age and all the parents get along through however they know each other, be it from your school classmates, neighbors, families, old sports teams that you wish the season never ended, or even lake friends? PFL is offering you the opportunity to bring them all as a group and have them play together in our league. Whether its a full team or any number of friends, we will definitely do our best to ensure they are all on the same team. No more politics as you are in charge (to a certain extent) of your roster and can ensure your child and her/ his friends have a comfortable entrance to this brand new sport coming to town. Kids can carpool to games and practices and this frees up parents a bit from their already busy schedule to rest assured that their child is taken care of even if they aren't able to make all the times work. Also, with such an influx of cultural diversity over the past few years in Westman,  participating or trying a new sport can be  beyond difficult due to language barriers and youth kids sometimes don't get an opportunity to try a new sport due to these restrictions.  Again, get everyone together and we will be more than happy to help and work with anyone to explain the game and drills so they can communicate these to their players. PFL has created and perfected a practice system to ensure every player is exposed to the same level of learning and instruction, for fairness,  and we have designed a structure that parents can identify their children at a glance, regardless of how many kids are on the field at any time,  even if they get to practices late. This takes the pressure off the parents and allows them a night off to relax and enjoy the beautiful weather that we always get in May and June Please feel free to come to our Second Youth Registration and information night this Monday March 12 from 6-8pm for youth (we will have a youth parent information meeting at 7:30 pm for any one interested, and Adult Info meeting will follow at 8pm.) If you have any questions visit our website at: prairiefootballleague.ca  or email: prairie_football_league@mymts.net.  

The Las Vegas Golden Knights have signed Brandon hockey product Zach Whitecloud to a three-year, entry-level deal, and he is expected to join the NHL club as early as Friday.  Whitecloud recently finished his sophomore season at Bemidji State where the 22-year-old had four goals and 14 assists in 36 games and was considered one of the top college free agents available.  He also played for Canada at the Karjala Cup in November and was on the radar to play for his country at the Olympics. Zach skated with the Brandon AAA Midget Wheat Kings in the 2013-14 season, and followed that up by playing two seasons with the MJHL's Virden Oil Capitals.  This summer he is listed among one of the guest instructors at Micheal Ferland's first ever hockey school.  

A normal night for Brad Benton, at Benny’s Astoria Pizzaria in Shoal Lake, is to prepare 25 large pizzas for team's travelling home following a game against the AAA Midget Yellowhead Chiefs. However, this Sunday with the blizzard hit, the bus driver for the Winnipeg AAA Midget Bruins felt the highways were unsafe to travel on and the team was forced into finding a new home for the night. This is where Brad Benton stepped up and offered his restaurant as a place for the team to wait out the storm. “When they picked up the pizzas at 10 pm, I told them to grab the players and stay in the restaurant for the night” said Brad.  According to Benton the next morning when he came back everything was in mint condition and the kids had a great time.  Everybody was safe and sound. “They left me a bunch of money for the booze and food and a thank you note” added Brad. Diane Cramer had already gone to gather some pillows and sleeping bags for two other stranded motorists, looking to spend the night on a couch inside the restaurant, when the 40 parents, players and coaches joined them. The evening served as an incredible bonding experience for our team, according to the team manager Marty Gagne.

Today marked the final weekend of play for 2017/18 in the Brandon Senior Men's Basketball League.  Each of the leagues four teams play a ten game regular reason schedule, followed by two weeks of play off action. Bronze Medal Game: (3)Royal Le Page 108 (4)Vern's Pizza 51 Championship Final: (1)Beezkneez 98 (2)Extreme clean 78 Top 5 scorers  Earl Ezzy Thompson Jr. 69 Oneil Gordon 40 Trevor Winters 26 Blake Majcher 23 Adam James 20

Calgary Flames power forward Micheal Ferland will be holding a hockey school in Brandon from July 5th to the 8th.   The reason behind the hockey school was quite simple, Micheal wanted to give back to the kids in Brandon and surrounding areas. A number of guest instructors have been lined up to help Micheal at the first ever Micheal Ferland Hockey School. Brigette Lacquette (Canada's Olympic Women's Team Member 2018) Harley Garrioch Jens Meilleur (Germany) Ryan Pulock  (NHL's NYI Islanders) Joel Edmundson (NHL's St. Louis Blues) Tyler Plante Shaq Merasty (ECHL) Josh Elmes (ECHL) Zack Whitecloud (NCAA) Details  Located at the Keystone Centre in Brandon, MB Novice, Atom, Peewee and Bantam age groups $350 for players, $300 for goalies (If you register by May 1st you will receive 10% off ) 2 hours on ice per day Dryland & swim sessions Free Jersey, T-Shirt and water bottle to register click here