Steinbach Regional Sabres building for WHSFL season

The Steinbach Regional Secondary Sabres varsity football team has a tough challenge on their hands to start the Winnipeg High School Football League schedule.

The Sabres take on defending champions Oak Park at home in the first week of the season. In order to prepare for the challenge, the team scheduled an exhibition game against traditional powerhouses St Paul’s Sept. 3. After a first quarter battle which saw the Sabres fall behind just 3-0, they faded in the third quarter, going on to lose 43-0.

Head coach Stephen Fedus said after the game he liked the way the team played in the fourth quarter.

“It took a little while, but the team started responding better to the different situations that we were facing,” Fedus told The Carillon a day after the game.

Springfield football aiming high in transition year

The Springfield Sabres football team will have a new look on the sidelines this season, but the play on the field should look the same.

Head coach Tom Walls has left the program, as he moves to Colombia. The coach has spent time around the world, including in America, Ireland and Korea.

“At fifty-five, I don’t know exactly what life in Colombia will look like, but I do know something I didn’t know fifteen years ago,” Walls wrote in his Substack.

“The opposite of fear isn’t certainty. It’s trust in yourself. Trust that you can make new friends. Trust that you’ll find meaningful work. Trust that, given enough time, unfamiliar streets become familiar, strangers become neighbours, and another place eventually starts feeling like home.”

Carillon Sports Second Shots: September 3rd edition

Featuring a Hanover Sting game Aug. 26, Hanover Kickers game at the Steinbach Soccer Park Aug. 28, The MCT Icebreaker Tournament in Morris Aug. 30 and Steinbach Pistons and Steinbach Regional Secondary School Sabres Football camps Aug. 31.

Toews not returning to Hanover School Division

Hanover School Division trustee Charmaine Toews is not returning to represent Ward 2 in the upcoming fall election.

“While I have decided that serving another term is not the right choice for me, I sincerely hope that good people will step forward in every ward in this election,” she wrote in a press release, noting the division needs “wise, respectful, professional, rational, and empathetic trustees who understand both the responsibility and the privilege of governing a school division.”

This was Toews’ first term as trustee and while her press release didn’t give a reason for not seeking re-election, she did share the reason why she decided to run four years ago.

“I wanted to represent the parents, students and staff of Hanover with integrity, ask good questions, listen carefully, and make decisions based on what would best serve our students and communities,” she wrote.

Altona Maroons join CRJHL

The Capital Region Junior Hockey League will be one franchise bigger this season, as the league welcomes the Altona Maroons.

The Maroons are the eighth franchise to join the league, which also features St Malo and La Broquerie. A franchise in Altona has been in the works for multiple years.

Altona will open their season hosting defending champion La Broquerie in a pre-season game Sept. 20. They will visit St Malo for the first time Oct. 30 and La Broquerie Nov. 20.

The CRJHL has added three teams since its founding in 2018. Beausejour joined in 2023 and La Broquerie in 2024. Altona will be led by Mark Thiessen, who coached the Winkler Flyers in the Manitoba Junior Hockey League between 2006 and 2010.

COLUMN: On the Fence Line – Helping a friend: Transporting someone else’s horse

Horse owners are always willing to lend a hand. Whether it’s hauling a horse home from a clinic, helping after a vehicle breakdown or transporting a horse in an emergency, assisting a fellow horse owner is part of what makes the equine community so supportive. Before heading down the road, however, it’s worth taking a few extra minutes to ensure both the horse and trailer are ready for a safe trip.

Before transporting any horse:

 Inspect the trailer, hitch, tires, lights and safety chains.

 Check that dividers, doors and ramps are properly secured.

Brian Esau running for third term on council representing Mitchell ward

RM of Hanover Coun. Brian Esau said he is running for his third term on council as there are projects he would like to see completed within the municipality.

“I’ve really enjoyed the last term and a half that I’ve been in here. I’ve really enjoyed working with the councillors and the reeve to make improvements in the municipality, and I would like to continue to do that,” he said. “There’s a few projects that we’ve started that I’d like to see come to fruition, and that’s the reason I’d like to run again.”

Esau comes from a rural background. He took over his father’s dairy farm just outside of Mitchell and ran it for 20 years before deciding to follow a different career path as the manager of an electrical company in Steinbach in 2002. He held that position for 21 years and upon retirement decided politics was his next path in life.

“I was on the LUD for just about 10 years, and so I got a taste of what I could make as a difference in Mitchell, and so therefore when the opportunity presented itself, then I just figured I’d take that next step, and I retired from my business so I had time to do this, so that’s the step I took,” he said.

Kaiser reflects on 3 eras of Pistons hockey

Brett Kaiser wasn’t sure he’d return for his fourth season with the Steinbach Pistons.

The 2005-born forward had been a mainstay on the team’s roster since he joined in 2022, but wasn’t sure he was going to play his 20-year-old season in the Manitoba Junior Hockey League.

Coming back to the Southeast Event Centre and the team’s brand new locker room had Kaiser return to Steinbach for his final year of junior eligibility, where he picked up a new career high in points, nabbing 59 across 56 regular season games to finish second on the team.

“Just seeing that facility and the rink and the fan support, it’s like, how can you say no,” Kaiser said after the team’s wind-up banquet earlier this summer.

Hanover School Division rescinds mature minor motion, Carillon editorial ‘slander and defamation’: Froese

The majority of the Hanover School Division board voted to rescind its mature minor motion to create a policy that would have removed a mature minor’s right to make their own health care decisions in Hanover schools.

During the first meeting of the year, the board voted nine to one to rescind the motion as directed by the education minister in a July 22 letter to the board.

In the letter addressed to board chair Dallas Wiebe, the minister cited the motion as going against the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Health Care Directives Act, the Public Health Act, and common law. She also cited concerns that health-care professionals would be hindered in providing care to students with disabilities, mental health needs and other conditions that would go “without treatment or accommodation.”

Minister Tracy Schmidt also questioned why the board would try to pass such a motion.

Dynacare inches closer to strike action

The Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals (MAHCP) hosted an informational picket on Wednesday after taking exception to what they call interference in bargaining by the provincial government.

Minister of Labour and Immigration Malaya Marcelino aske the Manitoba Labour Board to figure out if an essential services agreement was necessary.

Dynacare and MAHCP had agreed in March that Dynacare services are not considered essential under the Labour Relations Act and do not need to continue during a strike.

“These severely underpaid laboratory technicians and technologists thought the Manitoba government had their backs,” said Jason Linklater, MAHCP president. “Instead, the NDP is siding with a private, American-owned company over the rights and interests of Manitoba workers by interfering in bargaining and threatening their Charter-protected right to strike.”

SPORTS FLASHBACK 1983: Pacers win bronze at Jr. fastball nationals

The Steinbach A&W Pacers made good use of their second straight opportunity to represent Manitoba in the junior men’s national fastball championship, moving up the ladder to third place from their seventh-place finish of a year ago.

The Pacers travelled to Summerside, PEI and after a full week of competition, had a 6-2 record, with only Nova Scotia and Ontario proving to be better teams.

The Pacers opened play in the national championships with an extra-inning 4-1 win over Prince Edward Island, scoring three runs in the top of the eighth inning.

Steinbach then ran their record to 2-0, with a 10-inning victory over Alberta, highlighted by Randy Dutiaume’s solo home run that sent the game into extra innings. Jacques Levesque scored the winning run in that game, when he singled to lead off the 10th inning.