From KIBIHT to LIBIHT

By MARK HUNTER
Daily News Sports Reporter
KIBIHT is dead. Long live LIBIHT?
Fred Cavanagh, the former president of the Kamloops International Bantam Ice Hockey Tournament (KIBIHT), told The Daily News on Monday that the tournament is moving to Langley.
KIBIHT celebrated 40 years in Kamloops with its 2008 tournament. The new-look tournament in Langley will feature spring-league teams and is scheduled for April 28 to May 2.
KIBIHT announced on Aug. 27 that it wouldn't run a tournament in Kamloops next year. Cavanagh had been in contact with interested parties in Victoria and Langley about relocating the tournament, and decided on Langley.
“It's been in the process for about a week now,” said Cavanagh, who will help get things going in Langley next year. “Langley was the best choice to carry on the tradition that was carried on here.”
Because KIBIHT is a registered name, there was a financial exchange between those in Langley and the KIBIHT society.
“There was a slight monetary (exchange),” Cavanagh said. “Not much — basically it was needed in order to change the name. KIBIHT is a registered name, and to change it, you have to own the rights.”
There are a number of reasons KIBIHT has left Kamloops, the biggest of which is ice time.
Because of provincial championships and other championship tournaments around Easter — when KIBIHT traditionally was held — Cavanagh and the rest of the society decided that if the tournament was to survive, it would have to run later in the spring.
But the City of Kamloops pulls the ice out of the McArthur Island Sports and Events Centre — the most desirable location, with its two ice surfaces — for trade shows, lacrosse and other user groups. The City tried to get KIBIHT to use two city arenas — Interior Savings Centre and Valleyview Arena — as well as the privately owned Ice Box Arena.
Four ice surfaces would be needed to run a tournament, Cavanagh said, and that is something Kamloops wasn't able to accommodate.
“Langley has ice in (four buildings) year-round,” Cavanagh said. “It all boiled down, from Day 1, to the fact . . . we had to have ice at the end of April at the earliest. Langley has four sheets of ice in year-round.”
KIBIHT often was considered the crown jewel of Kamloops, which bills itself as the Tournament Capital of Canada. For four decades, the tournament brought the best 13- and 14-year-old hockey players to Kamloops.
Players such as Mario Lemieux (1979), Joe Sakic (1984) and Cliff Ronning (1980) played in the tournament before going on to NHL careers.
mhunter@kamloopsnews.ca