With the River Rush's first season over, players have mixed feelings about it being finished, especially those who had their final year in the KIJHL as they have reached the age cap for the league.
Seven Rush players are moving on, including the team's captain, Bennett Kuhnlein who said this has been his most fun season of hockey.
"Best group of guys I've ever had, just a bunch of guys I was ready to go to war with every night and happy to go to war with every night," he said. "Twenty-seven people in that locker room who I can call my best friends for the rest of my life."
Kuhnlein said while the team was swept in all four games of the best of seven series against the Kamloops Storm in the playoffs, the losses weren't as one-sided as it looks on paper.
"We were in three of the four games, just couldn't get a bounce to go our way," he said. "I'm proud of how the guys finished it off and just how much the boys grew this year."
Both of the Rush's coaches, Logan Maxwell and Jeremy LeBlanc, joined the team after the season officially began. They said as the season went on, the players got stronger and stronger.
LeBlanc coached Kuhnlein in the previous season when he played in the Maritime Junior Hockey League. Kuhnlein was the one who suggested LeBlanc when the Rush was looking for another coach.
"He was catching up the young guys really fast with what they needed to be able to compete in this league," LeBlanc said of Kuhnlein's leadership.
Some players were away from home for the first time in their life and Kuhnelin said he's proud of how those players have learned to exist without being around their family.
One of those players who was away from home for the first time was Jayden Mackie from Kelowna who was part of the Rush from the beginning of the season. He said the billet family he was with helped him adjust.
"They were awesome, they made it really easy for me," Mackie said. The other players on the team also helped. "We have a great leadership group that helped us through all that, especially like myself, being a first year player (they) made it a lot easier."
He said the team's senior players who are aging out of the league helped talk through some of the difficult times the team faced. Mackie said he saw that leadership all the way through to the final game.
One of the team's leaders who is aging out of the KIJHL and heading to New York for college is Cash Anderson. The day after the Rush's final game, he was still feeling a little bit disappointed.
"Pretty gut-wrenching feeling. I thought we had a really special group and I'm going to miss it for sure. I had an amazing season, so many memories were made," Anderson said. "There were so many ups and downs and there's a lot of perseverance in this group. We had a lot of struggles and a lot of ups and down but so much battle in this group to overcome a bunch of the things that happened throughout the year."
A big challenge the team faced was a massive sickness practically every player and coach got once they came back from the short break in winter. Some players didn't fully recover by the end of the season, making every game that much more difficult for the Rush.
"It was probably my most fun junior season," Anderson said. "Quesnel's a great town and we get to play in a great rink and great fan base. It was really what I wanted for my last year."
Throughout the season, new faces joined the ranks and some of them made huge improvements to the team. Kyan Gray started the year in the Alberta Junior Hockey League and just after the season began joined the KIJHL's Kimberley Dynamiters.
"I was in Kimberley until right before Halloween when I got traded to Quesnel. The trade was a win for me because I wasn't enjoying myself in Kimberley and it just wasn't working for me," Gray said. "Coming to Quesnel and kind of stepping into that spotlight is what I needed and I felt I had the opportunity to do that here."
The Rush had shuffled their goaltenders around a few times throughout the season, but once Gray joined the team he was rock solid. After just two practices he played his first game with the Rush, giving them a win in overtime against Castlegar.
"It was just awesome to get my first win with the team, especially that early on," he said. "We were such a tight group this year. I haven't had a team like that in my life before so it was awesome."
Throughout the season, Gray had 904 shots on his net and only 100 got by him, giving him a 0.889 save percentage.
All four players said the team was tight-knit and that led them to have high highs and low lows throughout the season.
In the regular season, one player edged out the lead in games played both with the Rush and when he was captain of the Kelowna Chiefs and that was Mathias Reha with 42 games played. Anderson was the team's top-goal scorer with 24, although he told The Observer he's never been able to score in a shootout. Topping the team's assist column was hometown player Isaiah Bagri with 34 throughout the regular season. Bagri and Anderson were tied for overall points in the regular season.
Something that won't surprise most fans of the Rush is who led the team in penalty minutes. The 5'5 Toren Fron racked up 196 minutes of penalty time in the regular season with his special way of talking to players on the other team and not letting his stature stop him from getting big hits on his opponents.
On the other end, Mackie, who played 36 games only had eight minutes of penalty time throughout the season.
The Rush season ended in February and the team's coaches have already started looking for players, having held their first ID camp for the 2025/2026 season in Quesnel. The season is set to begin in September.
