Thousands of men across the country are taking part in Movember, a campaign that aims to raise awareness about men’s health, and the Saint John Sea Dogs are following suit.

“Across the CHL, they’ve raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in support of men’s health for Movember, you know, growing the moustaches and obviously our team is going to do that too,” says Sea Dogs president Wayne Long.

“We’ve got a bunch of young kids right now, so I don’t know how good our team will be at growing moustaches, but there might be a couple of guys to give a good one,” says player Jason Cameron.

The team is using the moustache initiative to benefit men’s health, but also to increase attendance.

“So, if we can average 3,800 fans for the month of November, we’ll up our donation by $5,000,” says Long. “Further to that, if we sell out any game, which could happen, because we have some great games coming up, we’ll donate $10,000 per sold-out game.”

Attendance numbers have been down for some of the Sea Dogs games, but staff say, as they rebuild the team, their fan base is also being rebuilt.

“We have a little bit of work to do to reintroduce the team to the community, to get more connectivity from our team to the fans and vice versa,” says Long.

The Sea Dogs recently introduced a new head coach, a change the team hopes will turn their fate around.

“The rebuilding is happening, you know, the great years they had here, that’s pretty much the cycle in junior hockey,” says head coach Ross Yates. “Now, it is time to restock the cupboards and get some young talent in here. I think they’ve done a pretty good job so far and continue on with the plan and not steer away from it.”

The team hopes the Movember challenge will be successful and they’ll soon see larger crowds cheering them on.

“It’s really important, especially for the guys coming into the league, you know, you wanna see a packed building, you can see the difference, the atmosphere is electrifying. It is a lot of fun to feel the crowd and hear them when we’re coming out on the rink, when goals are scored, it’s a lot fun to have,” says player David Weckworth.

Right now the Sea Dogs are 16th in overall standings, but the team say with hard work and more support, they’re hoping to turn things around.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Ashley Dunbar