The new head coach of the Trinity Western Spartans hockey team has made his first move, signing a pair of junior A recruits.
Barret Kropf, who was named head coach back in April, has signed a pair of 21-year-old forwards: J-P Villeneuve (Georgetown, Ont.) and Josh Bruha (Cecil Lake, B.C.).
The pair are expected to bolster a Spartans offence which scored a B.C. Intercollegiate Hockey League-low 66 goals in 24 games in 2012/13.
Villeneuve played in the BCHL with the Powell River Kings and won a bevy of individual awards: team MVP, most popular player and the top community player.
And with 24 goals and 40 points in 54 games, he was second in team scoring.
Prior to that, he played in the Ontario Junior A Hockey League and he finshed with 200 points in 240 games at the junior level.
Bruha left B.C. in 2009 to spend four seasons in Saskatchewan with the famed Notre Dame program, helping the team win the 2010 Telus Cup. Following that season, he made the jump from midget to junior A with the Hounds.
In three seasons of junior, he had nine goals and 21 assists in 109 games and will be counted on to help at both ends of the ice.