For the past couple of weeks, nine SkyCity Stampede ice hockey players were team-mates with four West Auckland Admirals players, representing the New Zealand Ice Blacks — under the guidance of Stampede coach Cam Frear — in the IIHF Division 2, Group B world champs in Dunedin.
Come tomorrow night in Queenstown, they’ll be arch rivals again, with Frear back on the yellow and blue bench in a rematch of last year’s NZ Ice Hockey League final series, which Stampede won.
While the Admirals have been able to train throughout the world champs, Stampede took a little break due to the number of players and support staff in Dunedin.
That said, "I think we’re pretty confident any time we play at home [and] the goal is always to win two games".
Frear’s looking forward to an almost full-strength team coming in to this weekend — Connor Harrison’s still out following an injury during the Trans-Tasman Challenge in March, but will hopefully be back in the next month, "which will be huge for us going in to the crunch part of the season".
As to progress on imports this season, Frear’s coy.
"You’ll have to wait and see ... there might be some surprises this weekend."
- SkyCity Stampede v West Auckland Admirals, Queenstown Ice Arena, tomorrow and Saturday. Puck drop 7pm both nights
