Two Harbors-Silver Bay hockey merger details still fuzzy

The decision to combine the Silver Bay and Two Harbors boys’ high school hockey teams has been made.

How exactly it will be accomplished, and what that team will be called, is a different story.

“We’re going to sit down with all of you,” Dwight Moe, chairman of the Lake Superior School District School Board, said at the board’s meeting on May 14. “I’d like to have a joint meeting with all the parents and the coaches and (athletic directors). And let’s sit and talk about what’s fair.”

Moe said he wants to know how many players will be coming from each school before the board decides the terms of the split, including what percentage of games and practices will be played in Silver Bay and what percentage in Two Harbors.

Wade LeBlanc, head coach of the combined North Shore Bantam team, said the coaches of the two high school boys teams have given him projected numbers of 11 to 15 players from Silver Bay and 13 to 17 from Two Harbors.

School Board member Leo Babeu said the most important decision was agreeing on the merger. Now that it’s has been approved, the athletic directors can begin to work on the details.

William Kelley High School Athletic Director Roger Koster said he and Scott Ross, his counterpart at Two Harbors High School, hope to have the schedule finalized in the next couple of weeks.

“We want to get it done before school’s out,” he said. “Most of the teams schedule a year in advance, so most of the scheduling is being done or has been done right now.”

The merger of the boys’ teams may be new, but the girls’ hockey teams have been combined for about 10 years now, Koster said. Mike Guzzo has been the head coach of the combined girls’ team, which plays under the Silver Bay Area Mariners moniker, for four years.

Guzzo said the girls from different schools – some over vast distances – work well together as a team.

“Kids are actually real quick to gel,” he said. “I found out right away that when we had nine Ely-Babbitt kids join us, that I staggered the lockers in the locker room right away so that kids would have the chance to intermingle with each other.”

The girls’ team took the Mariners name because it was started by Silver Bay but the boys’ team is in a different situation. With two separate teams combining, the name will be up for debate.

Guzzo said Silver Bay has proposed a contest among students to determine the name.

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