Cape Breton hockey teams outraged over handling of provincial high school hockey tournament

The Division 2 boys high school hockey championships were played in Yarmouth, N.S., last weekend, but not every team that qualified for the tournament got to play in the event.

The Inverness Education Centre Rebels and Richmond Academy Hurricanes could not make it from Cape Breton to Yarmouth due to travel restrictions brought on by a storm that moved through their area late last week, closing schools.

"He's very disappointed," said Ray Poirier, who's son Joseph played for the Richmond team this season.

"It really does make you question why we as parents work so hard to do certain things when you see those kinds of decisions made."

Another Cape Breton team, the Dalbrae Academy Dragons out of Mabou Station, did make their way to Yarmouth because they left early enough to beat the storm.

Several players from the Inverness and Richmond teams arrived in time for the tournament opening ceremonies, but the rest of the team was only cleared to travel from Cape Breton to Yarmouth Friday afternoon, after the tournament had already started. The tournament continued without Inverness and Richmond taking part.

"When there is very little communication coming from the powers that be, it becomes an even more difficult pill to swallow," said Poirier.

School Sport Nova Scotia is the government agency that oversees school sports and all provincial tournaments. The organization's executive director, Stephen Gallant, did not reply to an email from CBC News asking to speak with him about the decision to carry on with the tournament.

Instead, he sent it to the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, which stated facility operational restrictions limited the ability to restructure the tournament to accommodate late participation.

School board officials said they followed extracurricular and travel policies when faced with potentially unsafe road conditions.

"Road conditions were reassessed at 10 a.m., at 12 p.m. and at 2:45 p.m. (Friday) to determine if it was safe for travel to resume," Deanna Landry, the co-ordinator of communications for the Strait Regional Centre for Education, said in an email to CBC News.

"Based on the review of conditions at 2:45 p.m. by our regional executive director, Paul Landry, in consultation with our operations department, teams were permitted to travel."

But members of the Inverness and Richmond teams say not enough was done to adjust the tournament schedule to allow the two Cape Breton teams to play their games on Saturday and Sunday, or potentially Monday. Only one game, the championship game, was played on Sunday.

"School Sport Nova Scotia really dropped the ball and were quite lazy, to be frank," said Michel Chiasson, whose son Allan was the goalie for the Inverness team this season.

"They just decided to continue on with the schedule without us and I think that just shows such indifference to these teams and it wasn't appropriate."

Rubbing a little more salt into the wounds of the Cape Breton players is the fact the tournament schedule was adjusted last year when Richmond hosted provincials. Stormy weather one year ago resulted in the tournament schedule being switched up so all teams from each region of the province could compete.

"There were things that School Sport Nova Scotia could have done last Friday but they didn't do anything," said Chiasson, who says he feels very badly for the players in Grade 12 who will not get another chance to play in a high school hockey provincial tournament.

"SSNS did not stand up for these two teams and in fact, they did nothing for them."