Sometimes, you just gotta know when to fold’em.
That cheesy song line pretty much explains the disappointment felt by Athabasca Aces head coach Curtis Creaser last week when it finally hit him that the only step to take was to fold the team for the coming season.
“It hurt,” Creaser said on Friday, a day after it was decided to close the doors on the Aces for this season.
“A lot of the guys that were still around understand and they all saw the writing on the wall.”
The final cards were dealt Sept. 27 when the team went to Morinville for an exhibition game with only nine players available.
“We had a core group of guys committed to full-time, but we were still about three or four short of what we needed,” Creaser explained.
“And with some of our part-time players, the conflicts started to add up, combine that with three of our top players not being able to commit as much time due to changes in their circumstances, and that’s it.”
Creaser is disappointed for the group that stuck it out and isn’t certain what the future holds for the team.
“The executive will be meeting soon and there will be a lot of questions that will need to be asked and answered,” he stated.
“In the whole scope of things, we could have managed this season if some of the guys that had given us verbal commitments earlier on had showed up for practices and demonstrated that they might be able to play.
“But, when someone can’t make the physical commitment, then realistically you can’t rely on them. And in this league, you need at least three lines to play at a competitive level, and we had trouble dressing enough for an exhibition game.”
The Aces were supposed to play a pair of home exhibition games last Friday and Saturday.
Creaser stated they would not have had enough players for those games and that was part of why the decision came when it did.
