Berries On Ice

If I had told you that there were Berries on the ice tonight, you might question my grasp of sentence structure in English as well as thinking of the image to the left. Some places use berries frozen inside ice cubes as a way to flavour water or seltzer, and I'm sure people enjoy that. I'm not sure I would because I like bolder flavours, but I'm also not a lemon-in-water guy either. However, there actually were Berries on the ice tonight in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan as the WHL's Saskatoon Blades ran a bit of a crossover promotion with the new Western Canadian Baseball League team in that city as the Saskatoon Berries hit the ice tonight!

I'm not usually a fan of hockey teams promoting another team in their city because hockey teams are already fighting for entertainment dollars from fans. This one falls into the exception category for me, though, because Saskatoon berries are a real berry, the Saskatoon Berries baseball team has yet to play a game as an expansion team in the WCBL, and the Blades are doing what other WHL teams have done in rebranding themselves for one night as a fun way to sell a few more tickets. Would it be cool for the Blades to keep this rebranding? Not in my eyes because they have their own brand, but for one night? It works as a fun promotion to help both teams!

The jerseys worn by the Blades tonight look pretty good as shown to the right. The Berries' distinctive logo has been slightly altered to show the Berry holding a hockey stick rather than a baseball bat, but the colour scheme for this jersey works nicely. I did have concerns that it may resemble the jersey worn by the QMJHL's Rimouski Oceanic or the Chicoutimi Sagueneens based on colours, but the Blades did well to create a unique jersey for the Berries. The light blue makes for a nice contrast to break up the darker purple colour, the hockey stripes work well to keep it looking like a hockey jersey, and the logo is prominently featured. Overall, a solid design for the Berries franchise!

As the above gameday graphic shows, the Berries were hosting the Lethbridge Hurricanes in tonight's game. After a scoreless first period, Saskatoon's Easton Armstrong notched the Berries' first score on the ice when Trevor Wong hit Armstrong driving the net on a 2-on-1, and Armstrong's redirection dented twine just 68 seconds into the middle frame for the 1-0 lead! The Berries were rolling!

The only problem was that the Hurricanes seemed to figure their side of the ice out and scored the next four goals en route to a 4-1 win. Clearly, things didn't go the way the Berries wanted, but that's the way the puck bounces sometimes. Despite the setback, the Blades remain in first-place in the WHL with a 42-12-2-3 record and 89 points while the Berries stand at 0-1 in their hockey record, and they'll try to flip that record on the diamond when they take the field for the first time against Regina on May 25.

Overall, the Berries may have lost the game, but it's pretty clear they're going to look good whether they're on grass or ice. If you have a few extra bucks kicking around, the Blades are selling their Berries jerseys via auction. Having a Saskatoon Berries jersey might be a cool addition to your closet, so check that auction site out. More importantly, though, make sure you catch the Berries on the diamond this summer as they look to win a WCBL championship!

Kudos to the Blades for helping a new team in the Saskatoon market find a little traction, for having some fun, and for creating some solid jerseys for the event. Outside of the final score, this looked like a fun night of hockey! And there's never anything wrong with having a berry good time at the rink, right?

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!