It’s not uncommon to see a local junior team filled with players from their community, but the Fort Frances Lakers are hopeful that a boost of local talent will help them in the 2023-2024 season.
Last season the team had three affiliate players from Fort Frances listed on the Superior International Junior Hockey League website as well as defenceman Darnell Kempf and goaltender Cameron Mann.
This season returnees Kempf and forward Jack Wood of Rainy River are joined by four other forwards hailing from Fort Frances, three defencemen as well as goaltender Jack Orchard, who hails from Emo.
The team also added forward Pierre Goulin and defenceman Matt Wherley from nearby International Falls, Minn.
“The new coaching staff [are] really trying to turn [things] around this year, getting a bunch of new players in, which includes local guys,” Wood said. “I played most of them in high school, so I know most of them.”
Wood had five goals and eleven points in 51 regular season games last year with the Lakers to go along with seven points in the team’s quarter-final loss to the Dryden GM Ice Dogs in five games.
“During the [COVID-19 pandemic year of 2020] I couldn't cross the border to play high school,” Wood recalled, when asked how he got on the Lakers radar. “So, I went to [Fort Frances] when I was 16 years old. Then when I graduated high school, [the team] reached out to me and asked if I wanted to come up.”
Between 2018 and 2022, Wood played in Baudette for the Lake of the Woods Bears, who skate in the Minnesota State High School League.
Baudette is just a five-minute drive from Wood’s hometown of Rainy River.
“Some kids will go across like I did, to play there," he said. "We have an arena, just not much of a program.”
Rainy River, which is 90 kilometres west of Fort Frances, has a population of 752 as of the 2021 Census, which is a decrease from 807 five years earlier (2016).
As many as 23 players have come from Rainy River, and Wood is the fifth player from the town to skate with the Lakers joining Carter and Reece Chorney as well as Bryson Jasper and Jaden Gustafson.
