Everyone Active Raiders reveal plans for pre-season

Everyone Active Raiders will start the 2023-24 ice hockey season with a series of four challenge matches.

Having ended the last campaign as Planet Ice National League play-off final runners-up to Leeds in Coventry, after a sixth-place finish during the regular season, Sean Easton’s side will welcome Peterborough Phantoms to Romford’s Sapphire Ice & Leisure Centre on Saturday, September 9.

And they make the return trip the following night, having won on their travels last year but lost on home ice.

The following weekend of September 16-17 will see the return of the Everyone Active Shield as Raiders do battle with Bees IHC.

Raiders are the present holders of the silverware after a pair of wins last season and head to Slough for the first leg against a much-changed Bees side, before hosting the return at the Sapphire the following evening.

Draft fixtures for the National League and Cup are already in place and being subjected to final clarifications with the opening games planned for the weekend of September 23-24.

The league will once again be made up of 11 teams, with Solway Sharks added to the mix in place of Basingstoke, who will not ice this season due to improvements at their rink, and Invicta’s Owen Dell agreeing a two-way deal.

And Raiders have retained the majority of their squad from last season, with George Norcliffe and Zack Milton joining from the Bison after the departures of Harry Gulliver (MK Lightning) and Tommy Huggett (Invicta Dynamos).

Tjay Anderson and Marco Pascale step up from the newly-renamed Buccaneers Division One South squad on full-time contracts, having impressed when icing with Raiders last season, with Brynley Capps and Joe Tomalin the latest youngsters to be offered the chance to follow in their footsteps.

Canadian forwards Alex Roberts and Matt Gomercic – who walked off with a hat-trick of awards last term – are not returning, but Adam Laishram will be back in a gold and blue jersey having featured in a dozen matches early last season before focusing on his university studies and is joined by defenceman Pierre-Luc Lurette.

Teams are able to include three non-British trained players in 2023-24 and Raiders have the final piece of their jigsaw lined up, with an announcement expected soon.