Four Sea Dogs games rescheduled

Michael Hawkins/Saint John Sea Dogs

SAINT JOHN - A number of Saint John Sea Dogs games were rescheduled by the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League on Monday.

The league announced it's stretching its Christmas break to 15 days "in order to give its players and staff a well-deserved break," according to a press release.

"The QMJHL understands the importance of giving players and staff a moment to re-energize and spend time with their families in the middle of this challenging season," read the statement. "The regular season schedule has been reorganized accordingly to give a two-week break to teams."

The Sea Dogs' last game of the first half is on Dec. 19. The team will not return to action until Jan. 6. 

Here are the Sea Dogs games impacted:

• Dec. 28 vs Cape Breton will be played Dec. 3
• Dec. 30 at Moncton will be played Dec. 9
• Dec. 31 vs Moncton will be played Nov. 25
• Jan. 3 vs Bathurst will be played Feb. 3

The move doesn't come as a huge shock as Maritimes Division teams are in a bit of a jam with the 14-day quarantine situation. When non-Atlantic players leave the Atlantic bubble for the holidays, they'll need to isolate for 14 days upon returning (assuming that rule is still in place, which it likely will be). Even if players returned on Boxing Day, they'd still miss three games (Jan. 6, Jan. 8 and Jan. 9). So... not sure what's going to happen with that, but this Christmas break extension helps out some at least.

Rescheduling the above games seems like an easy task given what the league has been going through the past few weeks. Some more bad news came out on Monday: Sherbrooke is turning into a red zone on Thursday and it's reportedly too late for the club to enter the Quebec City bubble.

The league will announce further details about its planned 11-day bubble later this week. The Gatineau Olympiques, Drummondville Voltigeurs, Blainville-Boisbriand Armada, Victoriaville Tigres, Shawinigan Cataractes, Chicoutimi Sagueneens and Quebec Remparts will play six games each at the Videotron Centre. The event will take place Nov. 17-27.

According to La Tribune, the seven bubble teams have been respecting a quarantine.

Rouyn-Noranada, Val-d'Or, Baie-Comeau, Rimouski and the Maritime clubs will continue play as usual.