June 28 golf tournament kicks off Senior Rangers 50th year celebration
June 9, 2025, 10:24 am
Ryan Kiedrowski, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
The annual Moosomin Rangers golf tournament is coming up on Saturday, June 28 with a little extra special meaning this year. This year marks the 50th season of Senior Rangers hockey, and organizers are looking forward to packing the Pipestone Hills Golf Club.
“It always ends up being a fun day, and a good chance for us to recruit some Booster Club members,” said Rangers president and Moosomin Director of Parks and Recreation, Mike Schwean. “We certainly encourage people that are fans of the team to come out, and even if they don’t want to golf, they can come out for supper and meet a lot of the guys that are going to be playing next year. So it’s a good event.”
For $150 per team (or $25 per player), they day includes 18 holes of golf and supper, plus a chance to chat with some of the coming year’s players off the ice. Schwean is anticipating just over 100 golfers out that day, with 18 teams of six people per group, and there’s still some space available to sign up by email msmn.rec.brd@sasktel.net or by texting Mike at 306-435-7578.
“It’s just a fun day for everybody, and a good way to kick off the next year for us,” Schwean said.
Schwean says the Moosomin Senior Rangers Hockey Club is accepting applications for a few positions for the 2025-26 season.
“With the Steelhawks coming to town, we wanted to kind of reinvent ourselves as well,” Schwean explained, listing the positions of general manager, head coach, trainer, and stick boy as being available. “That’s exciting for us, too. If we have any new staff, if we do have any new people or new positions, it’s an opportunity for them to meet everybody as well. If it’s the same staff as last year, it’s an opportunity for them to meet the new guys.”
Another crucial area where the Rangers are looking for people is in their volunteer pool—an job that has become more vital as game days become increasingly more busy.
“We have so much going on between the gate, the 50/50 in the lounge, and other things we have,” Schwean said. “We have promotions every game, so the people we can get out, they don’t have to sign up to do every game for the winter, most of our volunteers help out one game or two games a year, so that really helps us. We really need some more booster members to help with game day events, it’s become a fairly big job for us.”
The deadline to apply for any of the positions is June 13.
50 years and going strong
The annual golf tournament is the unofficial kickoff to 50 years of Rangers hockey, and Schwean hinted that there are plans in the works for future celebrations.
“We’ve got some things we haven’t announced yet,” he said. “We’ve got some exciting new things going on.”
Schwean says keeping a sports team going for half a century is a feat in itself.
“There’s lots of teams that have been around for 50 years or more maybe even, but senior hockey is tough to run 50 consecutive years, so I think it’s something we’re proud of,” Schwean said. “We’ve had some lean years along the way, and we’ve muddled through it. The last 10 years have been pretty successful.”
He noted the Rangers have had their ups and downs like any other team out there, with player dedication and fan loyalty being strong points.
“We’ve we’ve had our runs like most senior teams—top of the hill, bottom of the hill, top of the hill—but certainly we’re close to where we want to be right now. We’ve got some player recruiting going on right now. I can’t say who they are yet, but fans are going to be pretty excited when we announce our signings!”
The 2024/25 season was another exciting one to follow with Moosomin finishing the regular season two points shy of the top Redvers Rockets, who they also met in league finals. However, with finals and provincials rolling out at the same time, the challenge proved immense.
“We’ve come close to provincials, we had an easy run this year, but it was kind of unfortunate for us, we were missing, I think in the first game nine Junior hockey players in the provincial final,” Schwean said. “I think the second game we were missing seven, so it was unfortunate the way it worked out. We had guys working, we had a few guys hurt, and we picked up players from other teams who were playing at the same time. So it was unfortunate, the way that all went down.”
Despite not claiming a league or provincial title, Schwean looks back at the season fondly.
“We’re excited that we got that far, and this being our 50th year, it may be the year to finally win one of those.”
