WHEATIES BUSY OFF THE ICE NEXT WEEK
Brandon, Manitoba – Three members of the Western Hockey League’s Brandon Wheat Kings will be boarding the new Toyota Tacoma Community Cruiser and traveling to Souris Tuesday night as Coca Cola Bottling and Source for Sports will host its first Minor Hockey Caravan visit of the 2006-2007 season.
Veteran center Codey Burki will be joined by defencemen Keith Aulie and Theran Yeo at the Murray Arena, skating with both the bantam and atom teams from 5:30 – 7 p.m.
A second round draft choice of the National Hockey League’s Colorado Avalanche, Burki entered this weekend tied for the club scoring lead with right-winger Juraj Simek. Yeo is in his third WHL season while Aulie is a former first round bantam draft choice of the Wheat Kings.
In addition to taking to the ice, the Wheat King players will be signing autographs and distributing youth tickets to the Saturday, November 25th game against the visiting Saskatoon Blades.
Under terms of this promotion, the Wheat Kings plan to visit five rural communities throughout the season, with the second one scheduled for November. Deloraine, Oak Lake and Holland were among the towns visited by members of the Wheat Kings during the 2005-06 campaign.
In other off-ice news, Burki and Yeo will be among the players visiting area schools next week in conjunction with the hockey club’s popular CIBC Read to Succeed program.
While Burki joins captain Teegan Moore at Holland Elementary on Wednesday morning, Yeo will accompany right-winger Ryan Reaves to Kirkcaldy Heights the same day. The program, which was introduced by the Wheat Kings, CIBC and Brandon School Division in 2004, was designed after a pilot project developed by the WHL’s Vancouver Giants. These players will visit area schools this winter, talking to students about the importance of reading and education. In all cases, the players will read to the students and upon successfully completing a literacy challenge, to be introduced by each classroom teacher, the players will reward them with bookmarks and complimentary tickets to any upcoming game.
In addition to both Read to Succeed and the Minor Hockey Caravan, veteran left-winger Mark Derlago and veteran blueliner Mark Louis will be having lunch, provided by Subway, with the Kirkcaldy Heights School Patrols on Tuesday. The Wheat Kings’ School Patrol Program has been made possible through the generous support of both Manitoba Public Insurance and the Brandon Sun.
