Sheridan Boys Amateur Hockey Team To Play ‘A’ Level Competition This Weekend; Girls Play Away And At Home

Competition for the Sheridan Hawks Amateur Boys Hockey Team is going to step up 1 level, and it’s possible the team may do so next season.

The team is currently 11-0-1 on the season and plays in the State B League, which to some is considered the JV level.

The Hawks traveled to Casper back in November to play the ‘B’ team, but are returning to Casper this weekend, to take on the ‘A’ team.

Sheridan Head Coach Ryan Johnson says there is a lot of difference between the 2 levels in terms of style of play and the plan for the Hawks is to get back into the ‘A’ level.

“The biggest difference between JV and varsity, honestly, the speed of the game, but it’s the flow, so the flow of the game is just better, a little bit more crisp. The passes, the shooting. At that level, it can be kind of a game of mistakes and a lot of time, the team that makes the fewest mistakes, winds up winning the game. It’s very nitpicky. You make one tiny mistake, it can cost you the game, whereas at JV sometimes you can make mistakes and still recover. We debated a lot this last off-season on whether to go varsity this year or not and then we ultimately decided since our team is young, to stay JV one more year, but the goal is to go varsity and this is going to be a huge gauge to see where we stand.”

The Hawks are hosting this year’s State ‘B’ Tournament, which is scheduled for February 27th through March 1st.

The Sheridan Lady Hawks will have a busy weekend of games both on the road and at home.

The team will play at Miles City, Montana tomorrow evening and Saturday morning, then return home to play Gillette both Saturday evening and Sunday morning.

The Lady Hawks are the 2-time defending state champs and are currently 4th in the girls standings this season, while Miles City is 2nd.

Sheridan Head Coach Jay Charlebois says after a rough start to the season in November, the girls have responded well when it comes to getting their opponents’ best shot.

“They defiantly have been giving it to us. This is the first year that we’ve really had to face a lot of adversity as far as that goes. We’ve always still been at the top and I feel like we’re still in that position, but almost seems like some teams just want it a little bit more, but I think we’re at the point where we’re kind of overcoming that as a team and keep pushing forward.”

The trip to Miles City is the final road trip of the regular season, ahead of the state tournament.

After that, the Lady Hawks will play their last 8 regular season games at home.