MBHL Phase 1 – Team Practice

For the start of practices, here are the guidelines to be followed at Le Rinque for the week of June 22nd to June 26th.

1. Please arrive no more than 20 minutes before your practice.  An exception can be made for goalies who need longer to get suited up.
2. We recommend you bring water bottles filled from home.  The fountain will be available and sanitized between practices in case you forget.
3. Expect to be greeted by someone to sanitize your hands and ensure you are aware that you should not be attending the event if you are sick or have a potential to have been exposed to Covid-19.
4. Mezzanine areas will be closed.  No spectators allowed.
5. A maximum of 15 players are allowed to attend the practice.
6. You will be assigned 2 rooms that share a shower at the facility.  We kindly ask you to split your team up into these 2 rooms to respect spacing as much as possible. 
7. You must wait in the dressing rooms for a signal from arena staff that you are allowed to head on the surface.  They will ensure the other team is off before so you can proceed.
8. Once on the surface, you must keep all water bottles, sticks and other personal items on the surface.  The first 5-10 minutes while everyone warms up and shoots around will be used by arena staff to sanitize the player benches.  They will let you know when you are allowed to put stuff on the benches and then you are free to scrimmage if you so desire.  We recommend that you avoid situations where people are too close during scrimmages like ball battles and front of the net pushing.
9. Anyone spitting on the floor or benches should kindly be asked to leave the premises.  There will be a garbage can on the player benches that someone can use to spit if this is absolutely necessary.
10. Le Montview resto-bar will open as of June 29^th.

Here is an updated link for the practices. Please contact Norm if you will not be using your hour.

Practice List

As a preview of what’s to come down the line in the next phases, here are some rules changes that we have considered but are not official yet.  We are putting these out there to get the conversation going, gather opinions from captains and players as we build up to a potential start to real games in 2-3 weeks.  If you see Josh, Jordan, Jeff or myself around the arena and wish to discuss these ideas or others, feel free.

1. Anyone instigating a fight will be suspended until at least September 1^st.  We just can’t have increased physical contact.
2. Gloves are now mandatory.  We don’t enforce hockey gloves, but you can’t play without some form of gloves on your hands.
3. No face-offs.  The game will start with the home team having the ball at center and they can make a pass.  After a goal, the team that is scored upon, can get the ball at center and make a pass.  Other situations with whistles will give possession of the ball to one team or the other with 5 seconds to make a pass.
4. 3-second key.  We will outline a key on the surface where an offensive player is only allowed for 3 seconds or it’s a whistle and the defensive team gets possession.  This will prevent extended contact between a defender and a forward in front of the net.
5. 5-second board battle.  Within 3 feet of the boards, the referee will blow down battles for the ball after 5 seconds.  The team with possession prior to the scrum retains possession of the ball and have 5 seconds to make a pass to start play.