Restarting the youth hockey blog I began two years ago as I coached my son’s mite and squirt teams. This year’s thoughts and analysis begin from the parenting perspective. I am no longer behind the bench nor leading and developing practices during the week. Moreover, Brendan begins the year with his select/travel team, and my coaching time and effort focused on the house league. The team is the Hampton Roads Warriors and given that Warrior is a brand of hockey equipment and gear, it makes it easy to purchase t-shirts and sweatshirts with “Warrior” on the front.
The first travel of the year takes us to Middletown New Jersey for a Labor Day tournament. Brendan rides up with Joe, another parent and house league coach. I spend my weekdays in DC, having started a new job back in June, thus drive straight to New Jersey to meet everyone at the rink.
One can often judge the quality of hockey in an area by the facilities. This rink has two full ice surfaces, a coffee shop, skate shop, and a full athletic center which includes outdoor pools. One of the ice sheets has stadium type seating and large scoreboard hanging over center ice. To a child, playing at larger rinks provides a larger than life feel to the game. Indeed, this tournament has music playing between periods, and between faceoffs, a trait that doesn’t normally occur in house league games. Seeing how different communities place value to different sports displayed by the money the local community invests into these facilities is one of the better or educational aspects of travelling within the United States.
In high school, when our tennis team travelled by bus to other schools we could judge the quality of competition by the student parking lot. If the cars in the student lot were nicer than the cars in the teachers lot, we knew we were in for a long day. If the cars in the teachers lot were better than the cars in the student lot, we know we had a chance. In some ways I feel the same way travelling to other rinks…I will not only compare the rink to our home rink, but the cars of hockey parents to help me think about how much time and money they invest into the sport.
Over the summer at our local tennis club, I pointed out to Brendan and Sabrina the composition of the Williams and Mary men’s and women’s tennis team. Players came from all over the state, the country, and the world to include Europe and Asia. This is Brendan’s first full hockey tournament played on a full rink outside of the Hampton Roads area. We played 3-3 tournaments the previous two years, but on a smaller ice surface. Thinking about youth athletic development, its good for Brendan to skate against non-house league teams and gain an understanding of the quality and quantity of hockey players elsewhere in the country. Sooner or later every athlete learns that their individual competition isn’t constrained to their hometown area. Be it hockey, tennis, baseball, or basketball, the competition is global.
Weather it’s war or athletic competition, the ending matters more then the beginning. The team’s first game is Friday evening against the local team. Most of our players just finished a 7-8 hour drive and have yet to play a competitive game with each other. The local team rapidly scores two-goals in the first five minutes of the game, and quickly the feeling drops that the game might get out of hand, and we could be on the short end of double-digit loss. The kids fight back, apply some sustained pressure and sure enough Brendan skates to the right place, a rebound flies directly to his stick, and the first goal of the 22-23 season belongs to Brendan. This serves as a turning point for the team, and at the end of the first period we are down 2-1.
The second period is a back-and-forth affair, the home team scores on a powerplay, but the warriors spring back on the shift to keep it a one-goal game entering the third period. The local team scored to go up 4-2 halfway through the period, and with two and half minutes left the coach pulls the goalie for an extra attacker. The Warriors apply sustained pressure and score with a little less then two minutes left. The goalie quickly skates to the bench following the face off, and after some more sustained pressure the Warriors score again with 19 seconds on the clock. The players on the bench explode, jumping up and down with excitement.
There is no overtime, and the rules of this tournament dictate a sudden death shootout. The local team scores on their first attempt and our player gets off a decent shot but is countered with a better save. We walk away with 1-point and given the juxtaposition of the beginning and the end of the game, it’s hard not to be thrilled. The kids never quit, never got down on themselves or down on each other. The season starts off on the right foot.
In youth sports it’s important to recognize accomplishment and effort. Brendan earns game MVP for the team, and the coach awards him the MVP Triton. Another player earns the silver stick award for hardest worker. Often, in youth sports there are kids who play at a higher level, and game MVP or game ball/puck could go to a small group of players after each game. Recognizing effort after a week of practice or at the end of game gives every player no matter what their skill an aim point and a reason more than just winning to do their best.
Brendan Earns Game MVP
Taking time to decompress and process intense events is important for adults and children. Our hotel is in Edison, a 30-mintue drive from the rink. This seems inconvenient at first, but it offers time for Brendan to think about the game, and to talk about it in an unemotional way. When we arrive at the hotel, the kids clean up and we all meet in the lobby for pizza. We are a short drive to New York City and thank god we order from a local pizzeria and not a pizza chain. The kids eat their pizza and disappear to one of the hallways for some intense games of knee hockey. Our first game the next day starts in the mid-afternoon, so we let the kids stay up late while adults drink some adult beverages in the lobby. It’s nice to sit down with other parents to gain an understanding that the struggles one faces as a parent is not unique, and we all have similar balancing acts in our lives. Indeed, I find that building team chemistry among parents of a team is important as building chemistry between the players.
Saturday morning Brendan and I sleep in. We partake in the breakfast buffet, and take a 10-minute drive to Monkey Sports. In Southern Virginia there are few places to purchase hockey equipment, and the places that do sell hockey gear the selection is limited. This is Brendan’s first time in a store that is focused on hockey equipment. We get new gloves, a new stick, and I pick up a jersey for my own pick-up hockey I play in in DC. If you pray to the hockey gods five times a day, you do so facing Woodbridge, New Jersey.
Sometimes losing helps one learn to do things better, and sometimes losing helps one learn their place. Our first game on Saturday morning the Warriors lose to a team from Pittsburgh 8-5, but the score is misleading. Our five goals come on ten or so shots while the 8 goals scored by the other team come on over 40 shots. 90 percent of the game is played in our defensive zone, and the outcome of the game is never really in doubt. Our goals come on broken plays and breakaways, while the Pittsburgh team’s goals come after periods of sustained pressure. The Pittsburgh team is an AA team, one level below the highest level of AAA. So while the loss is discouraging, it serves as a focal point to understand what level of hockey we are at, and where we need to go.
O Represent Opposing Team Shots
X Represents Warrior Shots
Appointing a team captain in youth sports is a fruitless effort, and often the title goes to either the most talented player or to a coach’s son/daughter. Leadership is a combination of nature and nurture. Some people are born with dynamic personalities and inherent leadership skills. Others need time to nurture their leadership abilities. In both cases, effective leadership comes from practice, effort, and dedicated learning. For the Warriors, the coaches select the team Captain and Assistant Captains before the first game, then have those kids select their replacement for the next game. It’s probably safe to hold off on appointing full time captains until high school age, and even then leadership skills are just beginning. I recently graduated the Army War College where the younger students are in their early 40s, and there are still courses, lectures, and guest speakers all focused on leadership.
Following the second game the tournament hosts a skills competition open to all players who compete in relay races, shootouts, accuracy, and hardest shot competition. It’s a nice break from the games and offers some structured fun for all the kids participating in the tournament. This is the first time I have seen this type of event, and I hope other tournaments we travel to host similar activities.
The second game of the day is a disappointment in many ways. The team comes out flat and are unable to find any sort of offense. While they scored 5-goals against a AA team they can’t seem to apply any pressure. The kids feel the frustration which shows in some escalating chippyness on the ice. Both teams slash, and at a level where there is no checking, the game is filled with checks and other aggressive body contact. It doesn’t help that there is only one referee assigned to the game, and thus potential penalties behind the play go unnoticed. Fortunately, at the 10U level, kids don’t have the hormones going through them as high-school and college age kids do, thus no fights break out on the ice. Had this been a higher level or age group the game would have gotten out of hand. When the horn blows at the end of the period the Warriors are shut out.
It’s late, and the next game will start at 8:45 the next morning. As Brendan takes off his equipment, he tells me he just wants to go back to the hotel. I figure he needs some decompression time, and probably something to eat. We head over to Mo’s (Welcome to Mo’s!) for dinner before the long drive to the hotel and sitting down talking through the game has some therapeutic effects. Halfway through his burrito bowl, Brendan talks about the game and does some pretty good analysis for a 10-year old. When we first sat to eat, I heard complaints about the referees, and complaints about the other team. This is normal in both youth and adult sports. We are more likely to find fault in others for our own failures, rather than conduct some introspection. Listening to Brendan transition for blame to acceptance to communicating what he could do better was a proud parenting moment. We jump into the car and head back to the hotel and given the time we get back neither of us is up for staying up late.
The final morning, we have breakfast, drive to the rink, and Brendan heads inside to warm up with his teammates. I walk outside to the parking lot to meet my father who drives down from Connecticut to see Brendan play. Brendan is completely surprised to see his grandfather, but I can sense his joy. Knowing his grandfather woke up early to make a two-hour drive to see him skate lets him know that he loved, and there is nothing more important to a child than having and keeping that knowledge.
The last game is competitive, and after the first period the Warriors are down 1-0, with the only opposing goal coming at the tail end of a 2-minute 5-3 power play. About halfway through the second, the opposing team scores a couple goals in short order, and at the end of the game the scoreboard reads 6-0. The kids are frustrated having gone consecutive games without scoring a goal, but take out their stress by celebrating a teammates birthday with donuts before the long drive home.
Ending the last game with a handshake underneath the scoreboard.
Warriors in White.