A city can鈥檛 host international sporting events without some disruption.
The 2019 International Ice Hockey Federation world junior championship will expel the Victoria Royals out of Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre from Dec. 15 to Jan. 9.
That is the central highlight of the Royals鈥� 2018-19 Western Hockey League schedule, which was released Tuesday.
The Royals will play six road games through the Central Division while the world juniors take over their building. Because it鈥檚 mixed in with the WHL鈥檚 annual Christmas break, the road trip runs from Dec. 28 to Jan. 5 and so is not an overly cumbersome feature of the schedule.
鈥淲e normally like to get our Eastern Conference road swings out of the way earlier, in the first half of the season. But all things considered, it actually worked out pretty well,鈥� said Royals GM Cam Hope.
The regular season opens for Victoria with a two-game home set against the Prince George Cougars on Sept. 21-22. The traditional season-closing home-and-home set against the Everett Silvertips goes March 15-16.
The longest homestand of the season, meanwhile, will feature six games from Oct. 13-27. It is during that stretch the defending WHL-champion Swift Current Broncos, featuring rising sophomore defenceman Jacson Alexander of Victoria, make their once-every-two-years visit to Blanshard Street.
The reduction of the WHL regular season from 72 games to 68 has meant certain modifications to the program. The Royals will continue playing the cross-strait Vancouver Giants 10 times, more than any other team. Two other sa国际传媒 Division opponents have been bumped up to nine games from the previously regular eight. Victoria plays Prince George nine times, five at home and four on the road, and the Kamloops Blazers also nine times, four at home and five on the road. The games against the Kelowna Rockets will remain at eight, split evenly between home and road.
Games against U.S. Division teams will remain at four, two at home and two away.
Royals鈥� home games will feature on six days of the week, with the weekends the most popular dates with 12 on Saturdays and 10 on Fridays. The are two Sunday matin茅es. The mid-week includes five Wednesday games, four on Tuesday and one on Monday, although the latter is a long weekend Family Day matin茅e in February.
There will be a total of 748 regular-season WHL games played in 2018-19, down from 792 last season, because of the schedule reduction the league says was made to 鈥減rovide more time for players to focus on training and skill development, as well as their academic studies.鈥�
The WHL has played a 72-game schedule since 1975-76.
鈥淲e鈥檒l see how it works out, but this puts us in line with the other two major-junior leagues [OHL and QMJHL], which both play 68-game regular seasons,鈥� said Hope.
鈥淲ith all the travel we do, having more down time, and more time to practice, should be a benefit for the players.鈥�
It also couldn鈥檛 help but be noticed by pundits the general attendance decline the past few seasons, particularly for weekday games. There will be 49 fewer weekday games played this season than last season.
鈥淧eople have jobs and family and we understand that,鈥� said Hope.
鈥淏oth our dropped home games are weekday games. We鈥檒l have the same number of weekend home games as last season.鈥�
The league said the number of prime-day games will increase to a total of 607 on weekends, holiday Mondays and over the Christmas break. That is 81 per cent of all games played during the upcoming season, which is an increase from the 585 such games, or 74 per cent, played on those prime dates last season.
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