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BCHL  

The loss of a rival

For the Penticton Vees, moving the West Kelowna Warriors will mean one fewer rival nearby that fans can see their team play on the road.

Warriors owner Mark Cheyne confirmed Wednesday morning the team has an offer pending, with the potential new owner set to move the team to North Delta's Sungod Arena.

"It's a business, and it starts with ownership – we're going to lose a really good owner, there," Penticton Vees head coach and general manager Fred Harbinson said. "West Kelowna's done everything possible there to make it work."

For Penticton, moving the Warriors means fans won't have that nearby rival to support the Vees at during away games.

"Our fans go and travel there when we play, and vice versa," Harbinson said. "It'll be difficult to see them go."

On top of an easy travel for fans to go to away games, Harbinson adds home games against the Warriors riles up the fanbase as well, which will be lacking if they move or dissolve.

"When we play Vernon, when we play West Kelowna, yeah, all the fans kind of get into it, and now we're going to lose one of those teams."

But Harbinson said the most important thing for the league is the loss of what he calls a good owner.

"At the same time, as president of this team, I can't disagree with the fact that Mark Cheyne wants to sell the team," he said. "It'll be one thing if they didn't do things the right way – they have. I can attest that they, their guys were in the community all the time, they've put winning product on the ice."

Harbinson also pointed to the Warriors winning a national championship, but the team "still (gets) eight, 900 people a game."

He adds while the proximity of the Kelowna Rockets likely has something to do with the team's inability to draw a crowd, a lack of centralization in West Kelowna may also have an impact.

"Junior has a lot to do ... with community," Harbinson said. "There's no real downtown, it doesn't have a city feel, it's more of a suburb of Kelowna, and yes the Rockets are there, of course that's what it is."



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