When the puck drops to begin the Heritage Junior Hockey League’s 40th season, the Mountain View Colts will be on the road in Medicine Hat.
The opening weekend of the 2026-2027 regular season features a two-game road swing for the Colts with the reigning HJHL champions – the Medicine Hat Cubs – up first at 7pm on Saturday, September 26th followed by a Sunday matinee at 2pm versus the Copperheads in Coaldale.
Colts Head Coach Rob Turville points out that with a entirely new coaching staff for this season he is pretty excited to start the season off on the road. Turville says “kind of gives the team a good opportunity to really gel, start the season off on the right foot and kind of get everybody on the same page. Having that overnight trip that very first weekend, I think that is a great opportunity for us as new coaches to come in and really get to meet the kids and kind of get a good feel of seeing what everyone is about.”
Gord Krebs, Mountain View’s General Manager, notes it is pretty special to be involved with a league that is reaching the milestone of four decades. He says “great bunch of people that have ran the league over 40 years and it is good to do our part to keep it going. The Colts have actually been a part of the HJHL since 1989, so we weren’t one of the first original eight teams but we started as the Carstairs Colts in 1989 and other than one year of a leave-of-absence in the middle we’ve been there ever since.”
Mountain View’s home opener will be on Friday, October 2nd at 8:15pm when the newest team in the HJHL – the Rimbey Royals – visit the Didsbury Memorial Complex. Krebs is excited for Rimbey to join the 12-team league. He says “they tried to get in several years ago and it just didn’t work out. I’ve talked to their General Manager on the phone a few times and he is a real hockey guy. Really looking forward to meeting him face-to-face and it is going to be good to get some new blood in the league. We’re playing Rimbey in exhibition during the September 18th (in Didsbury at 7:30pm) and 19th (in Rimbey at 8:30pm) weekend.” The Colts play a total of four pre-season games with the others slated for September 16th at 7:30 at the DMC against the Red Deer Vipers and on the night of September 21st in Red Deer at 8 o’clock.
According to Turville, the release of the schedule in general is kind of the first step to really build momentum for the season. He says “it kind of gets everybody thinking and looking forward to the season. If you take a look at the calendar, training camp is only two months away and before we get into exhibition and then into the season. So having the schedule released – and in particular knowing when our home opener will be – it kind of gets the juices flowing and gets the excitement going for the season.”
The final weekend of the regular season will be spent at home for the Colts with 8:15 start times on Friday, February 12th versus Red Deer and on Saturday, February 13th against Medicine Hat. Krebs says “I think the big thing with our team right now is we are hosting provincials and that is great, we are really excited about it but we want to go in as champions not just as hosts. So that is what our goal is.” The Colts host Hockey Alberta’s Junior B Provincial tournament from April 7th through the 11th of 2027.
Other key dates as the local Junior B club gears up for the season include the conditioning camp the last week of August – the week of the 24th. Turville says “we’ll have four skates throughout that week. Then going into that the first week of September, we’ll kick of main camp. We’ll start off with our first skate on September 1st and then we’ll follow it up with three more skates throughout the next two weeks before we get into our Blue and Red game which will be on September 14th at the Didsbury Memorial Complex.”
The Mountain View Colts annual golf tournament is on Sunday, August 23rd at the Trail Creek Golf Course. It is 18-holes of golf, best ball with a 10am shotgun start. Contact Krebs at [email protected] for more details or to sign up.
You can also check out the website mvcolts.ca or follow the Colts on Facebook.
Listen to 96.5 The Ranch’s Community Hotline conversation with Rob Turville.
Listen to 96.5 The Ranch’s Community Hotline conversation with Gord Krebs.
From the archives, listen to 96.5’s first chance to speak with Rob Turville in May after he was hired as the new bench boss of the Colts.
