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greybeard58 wrote:Bo,
Spring Lake Park in the 90's and 80's fielded teams at the A level for Squirt,Peewee and Bantam along with Fridley, Columbia Heights then East River. After David Backes moved on to High school Spring Lake Park started at the Bantam level having a B level teams. They played a couple more years at the A level in both Squirts and Peewees and then about 2002 went all B and now occasionally have participated at the A levels.
The SLP player that player B level all the way through youth and ended up playing hockey at Colorado College was Addision Deboer(sp).

I was pretty sure in the day of John Tykeson('90-SLP- (friend of mine)- SCSU), Paul "Pudge" Frank('89-SLP- Denver), and Heath Deboer('87-SLP- Blues draft pick) that they played B level Hockey.

I thought they were getting stronger recently by being able to form some A teams....? They fell apart after Backes?
Do you know if Backes played/was offered A all the way through?

Bo,
Whether he made the A team, during the time David Backes was in the youth program, I repeat Spring Lake Park fielded teams at the A level for Squirt, Peewee and Bantam. If you still have doubts ,dig out an old D10 handbook and contact the A Bantam coordinator at that time,his memory is very good.

Greybeard,

They should be easy to understand questions........ So now I GOT the answer that they were offered A Hockey throughout the 80's and 90's. Thank you!

Could you answer the question of....." have they become weaker" since the end of the 90's to have to play at the B level most of the time?

I thought all the big home developments, in the SLP District, was the cause for them turning into a contender for the first time.

What changed after 20+ years to have to play B Hockey after the year 2000?

Thanks in advance!

Not that this matters.... He was still a big fish in a small pond.

In the 90's The SLP A Bantams did not finish any higher than 6th place in league play and when David was a Bantam they finished 7th. As for A Peewee the highest was 5th place during the 90's.
As to why they started playing B level hockey my best guess is parents wanted winning records rather than finish 2-13- 1 as their A Peewees did in the 1999-2000 season. A lack of recruiting is another possibility. While they might have been contenders in High school, during the 90's at the Peewee and Bantam levels they were below .500 and some years finished either on the bottom or with in 2 places of the bottom.