WCHA takes a swing at baseball

The Western Canada Hockey Academy has added another sport to its offerings for its young athletes.

WCHA announced earlier this month that they are expanding on the hockey-golf hybrid program with EVO Golf by adding a hockey-baseball/softball offering with Triple Crown Sports at the TC Indoor Sports Facility.

WCHA principal and head educator Lesley Taggart identified that working with Triple Crown owner and instructor Faron Asham could be beneficial for everyone involved, WCHA’s vice president of operations Jason Roblin said.

“She saw it as an opportunity to expand or offer the same sort of thing that was working so well with EVO with baseball,” Roblin said. “The kids would go to Faron’s facility on Mondays and Wednesdays if they’re not in the full hockey program or full golf program. It just expands to more multi-sport athletes.

“It’s only for Grade 7 and 8 this year: We want to make sure we get it right before we expand to the lower grades.”

The private school has a handful of Grade 4 students but is mainly for students in Grades 5 to 8.

It began to offer the golf hybrid program a year ago for Grades 7 and 8s. This year it will be expanded to Grade 5 and 6 students too.

“On Mondays, they’ve usually played hockey on the weekend and they’re tight and tired from the weekend so they take a golf lesson instead of skating and do the same on Wednesday,” Roblin said. “We’re reducing the amount of time they still get on the ice but still doing the development.”

With baseball/softball, student-athletes will attend a pair of baseball classes each week led by Asham at the indoor facility with other coaches also coming in.

“We’ve been pretty busy with our Bulldog program and we received a call from over at WCHA,” Asham said. “They were wondering if there was an opportunity for some of their hockey players to come over and work out on some of their free time during the day because they don’t have enough gym over at their facility and the school gyms are obviously booked during the school year.”

The WCHA rented the field house on a casual basis, and Asham subsequently heard from Taggart about developing a more formal arrangement.

“We’re providing basic skills development for six players who are doing a baseball-softball-hockey program,” Asham said. “We see it as an interesting development and an interesting relationship between WCHA and Triple Crown. This is the first step into it and we don’t know where it’s going to lead into the future, but as it is right now, we’re happy to introduce more players to baseball and softball.”

WCHA is also considering a volleyball program in the future. “We’re trying to do things at a slow progression and doing it right rather than expand into multiple sports at once,” Roblin said. “Golf worked out really well and I’m hoping the same works for baseball.”

It’s a refreshing development in the age of sports specialization when high-end young players tend to wholeheartedly pursue a single sport year-round. Asham said he’s a big fan of young athletes broadening their horizons.

“It’s very important and we’ve always stressed it at Triple Crown,” Asham said. “You’ve got to play some school sports, play hockey, go curling, do something that is going to keep you active. The more you concentrate on one sport, the less athletic you’re actually going to be.”

He said it will benefit the hockey players to learn different movements and a new sport.

It also fills a void at the 15,000-square-foot facility, which opened late in 2023 at 3500 McDonald Ave., in the spot used by the Wheat City Curling Club prior to 2010.

They’re open 9 to 9, with Asham noting it can be quiet during the day-time hours despite rates being a little better.

“The Fieldhouse is holding its own,” Asham said. His facility has appealed to a wide cross-section of Westman’s athletic community: Among the sports they’ve hosted beyond softball and baseball are lacrosse, rugby, soccer, cricket and football.

“We’re really getting a taste of all the sports that are available in the Westman area, and that’s exactly what we wanted when we brought the concept to reality,” Asham said. “We’ve got the gamut of sports.”

Triple Crown’s Bulldogs program is entering its third winter, with a focus on skill development and trips down to American tournaments to showcase players to college coaches. The softball program runs from September to March and baseball from October to March, with softball starting earlier because that’s when tournaments in the United States begin.

Three years ago, the softball program began with one team. Now, it has U12, U14, and U16 levels, as well as an invitation-only U18 squad.

The latter group comes from across the province and is attending three showcase tournaments that will include college coaches scouting for talent. In Las Vegas a year ago, they played in an event with over 100 teams and 300 coaches in attendance and took silver.

When Asham opened registration for this winter, the U14 team sold out in 55 minutes, and now all the softball teams are booked with waiting lists.

“This year has shocked me with the outreach,” Asham said. “We’re getting a feel for it with some of the questions and the volume of calls and texts I was getting asking for information. Based on that, we actually opened up early registration for our returning players, because we want to be loyal to the ones who helped us get started.

“We had about 65 per cent retention rate prior to opening up and then we sold out. It was exciting and daunting at the same time.”

The baseball program features teams in the U13, U15 and U18 divisions.

“There certainly was a demand in softball and baseball has followed suit,” Asham said. “They’re down to very limited spots at this point.”

In other WCHA news, the academy has hired former Wheat Kings stars Mark Derlago and Colby Robak, replacing Aaron Rome and Ryan White after they took assistant coaching positions with the WHL club.

They’ve also brought on a second teacher, Jonathan Filewich, and will soon be holding tryouts for their spring hockey team, the Wolves.

But for now, all eyes are on their second foray into providing their students with a multi-sport experience.

“It’s an alternative to public school,” Roblin said. “That’s part of it. There are gym classes with 30 kids at the public schools, which is just reality. It’s smaller class sizes and they get a little more attention. They do a workout with Paul Thompson every day as well so they’re getting their school work done, their workout in and they’re focusing on the sports they want to develop at.

“Typically, that development is done in the evening, so this takes a bit of strain off the parents, running to the academy to do a private session in hockey and then going to Faron’s facility after supper to do some throwing or some hitting. This just frees up time for families. That’s one of the biggest benefits of it and the kids are still getting their development.”

» pbergson@brandonsun.com