The town of Pense, just west of Regina, tried to become the first Saskatchewan town to win the Kraft Hockeyville promotion earlier this month, but they were beaten out by Twillingate, Newfoundland.

Had Pense won, they would have received $250,000 to be used for arena upgrades.  It would have gone to replace the brine piping system in the rink.  Even though they did not win, Pense still received $25,000 for being in the final four.  That was quickly followed by Saskatchewan businessman Brett Wilson donating $25,000 with Saskatoon-based Shercom Industries and Regina Motor Products doing the same thing.

They were gestures that put the total fundraising effort in Pense to over $200,000 which Graeme Crosbie with the town’s rink board says is a definite improvement from this time last year.

“The last time we looked, we were at $218-thousand which is remarkable.” Crosbie said. ” We are more than two-thirds of the way there thanks to the generosity of many.  Last year at this time, that figure stood at $3000 dollars so we are obviously very happy despite the fact we didn’t win the designation.”

Crosbie adds the moral of the story is Saskatchewan helping Saskatchewan as the province got behind what Pense was doing and did what they could to help them not only try to win the contest, but then help with the fundraising efforts.  He says while they didn’t win, there is a thought process that they did because of all that has happened.