The Gremlins’ Camden Markham looks for a teammate to pass to during the opening game of the scramble Thursday at Dee Stadium in Houghton. (Daver Karnosky/Daily Mining Gazette)

HOUGHTON — While the games played Thursday at Dee Stadium will not count in the standings for the several western U.P. high school hockey teams, four squads had a chance to get to see what they had and where they needed to focus as the Houghton Gremlins revived the scramble. The Gremlins hosted the Jeffers Jets, the Hancock Bulldogs, and the Marquette Redmen for a round-robin day where each team played three, 20-minute scrimmages.

The Gremlins came out on top, defeating the Jets, 4-0, the Redmen 4-1, and the Bulldogs, 3-0.

For Gremlins coach Corey Markham, the chance to bring back the scramble was too good to pass up.

“This is something I had been thinking about for the last few years, that it’d be nice to have back,” he said. “I was actually going through some of Don Miller’s old files, and we had folders of the old scramble. I knew that we were hosting Marquette for our scrimmage. (I thought,) ‘Let’s try and do this.’ So I contacted Micah (Stipech), and contacted Scotty Mikesh and Pat Nettell. They were all excited for it. Doug (Garrow) was excited for it, so we decided to bring it back.”

Coming at the start of the season, after teams have had a week of tryouts, the scramble gives coaches a chance to take a look at their own team in a game situation, and a chance to make final roster decisions, if need be.

Of course, it also gives fans a chance to see nearly all the local teams as well.

“I think it’s great for local hockey fans, especially (since) they get this kind of sneak peek of what the teams are gonna be like,” Markham said. “It’s great for the kids, too, kids that are battling for roster spots. (They) gets a little varsity action and we get to evaluate them like that before we make final cuts. So, I think it’s just a win-win for everybody.”

Markham, Mikesch, and Nettell all played in the scramble when they were in high school, so when Markham reached out to MIkesch and Nettell, who were scheduled to play each other in scrimmage, they both jumped at the chance to revive something from their own experiences.

“We were supposed to play in a scrimmage just against Jeffers,” said Mikesch, who is the coach of the Bulldogs. “Corey was supposed to play against Marquette. Corey gave me a call and said, ‘What if we got the old scramble from the back in the late 80s? I said, I think it’s a terrific idea.”

The Bulldogs dropped their game against Marquette, 2-0, but beat the Jets, 2-0.

For Mikesch, whose team opens the season officially in Alpena on Friday, Nov. 18, the scramble gave his young players a chance to see what high school hockey is all about.

“I know that this is going to make those younger guys, even our older guys, especially just get their feet wet and experience this tempo, and the speed of the game, and the physicality,” said Mikesch. “That’s what I like about it. We learn things as coaches about our players too, who’s ready and who it might be a little bit too much for at times.”

For Nettell and the Jets, the opportunity to take part in a set of scrimmages like the scramble helped get the nerves out, even if they fell in all three games.

“I just remembered the feeling when I first played in it, you’re nervous and you’re scared,” he said. “It’s just a total blast for the kids to see it and experience it.”

Hockey players often gain more from game experience than teaching moments in practice, and for Nettell, the opportunity to get to see his players in action was too good to pass up.

“Even though it’s a 20 minute period, it’s still a hard game,” he said. “Especially for your first one starting out. You don’t know, really, what you have until you see it out there.”

Garrow, the Redmen coach, has memories of being an assistant coach when the Redmen competed in the scramble in the mid-1990s. He felt there was a lot to learn about his team, and about the teams in the Copper Country, through playing through the afternoon where they lost to Houghton, but beat Hancock and Jeffers, 3-0.

“I like the format,” he said. “I mean, when I was an assistant here in 95, we used to do that, and I’m not sure when it stopped. But, I like it.. I think it gives everybody a chance to see everybody. It’s good for the fans up here. You can see four teams, and it’s just a good atmosphere.”

Getting a chance to see Houghton, Hancock, and Jeffers, before facing Brother Rice to open the season, was something that Garrow felt was a real benefit to his young squad.

“We open next Friday in Brother Rice, so we’ve got our hands full,” Garrow said, “but I think we’ll be ready. I think Houghton’s got a good team and we played them first. It was kind of nice to play them first and get that speed that they’re used to. This is their home building, so I thought it was a good atmosphere.

“I thought our guys played well. I mean, there’s always stuff you can work on, but I thought overall, I thought we played well. We have a long way to go. We’re younger than we were last year, and we lost a lot, but I like our work ethic. I think we’ve got some potential.”