As David Cole hunched down and started skating, a shriek and laugh could be heard on the normally quiet Sunday afternoon ice at the St. Pete Times Forum. Cole, the Director of Fan Development for the Tampa Bay Lightning, was giving a participant at the team’s first sled hockey clinic a spin around the ice.
In that trip across the playing surface, Cole wasn’t just giving a disabled athlete a chance to feel the cool air of the rink blow past. He was an example of the efforts of a group of volunteers to bring sled hockey to Tampa ...
"Dylan Sled Hockey Adventures"
Although sled hockey is new to the Tampa Bay area, it is a sport that has grown steadily in hockey hotbeds in recent years. Invented at a rehabilitation center in Stockholm, Sweden in the early 1960s, sled (or sledge) hockey was developed to give disabled athletes a chance to participate in the sport.
The initial design of the sleds, which coupled a modified metal frame sled with two regular-sized ice hockey blades, has been developed into a similarly designed yet lighter piece of equipment. The sticks resemble those found in professional hockey, although they are about a third of the size and feature picks at the ends so that players may propel themselves across the ice.
Aside from some minor differences in equipment the beauty of sled hockey is that it is played almost exactly like traditional hockey.
Those similarities are what made the development of a sled hockey program so enticing to the Lightning and the Lightning Foundation.
After being approached by Travis Leigh, a disabled athlete who played sled hockey in California while he was in college, Cole and the Lightning Foundation’s Executive Director Nancy Crane saw an opportunity to expand both of their programs.
“I think it’s a natural thing for us to be involved in sled hockey,” Cole said. “I think our goal is to pretty much reach the whole community, from boys and girls of able bodies to boys and girls who are challenged physically, and then adults as well. I think this is another component of what we’re trying to do, so it was a logical step.”
“Travis came in last Christmas and educated me and everyone else about sled hockey,” Crane said. “We had heard of it but we had never seen it. He showed us a tape of the Olympics and the Paralympics – in 2002 the U.S. won the Gold in sled hockey and that’s when interest really started.
“It’s going to be very expensive as a start-up. Just for 12 sleds it is $10,000, and then you have to add on jerseys, helmets, pads and shin guards. Even so, we had our first meeting, and to see a child who has never been able to participate in sports be able to get on a sled and play sled hockey is the most rewarding thing.”
The ultimate goal of the Foundation is to give these athletes a chance to play hockey. In reaching that goal the Lightning are the first professional team to work toward not just funding, but also running their own sled hockey program.
“I was in a tournament in Denver and I saw the involvement of the Colorado Avalanche in their sled hockey team,” Leigh said. “They let them use their jerseys and their uniforms. The sled hockey team is under its own non-profit organization, but it does have an affiliation with the Avalanche so there is some partnership there. Ours is different here in Tampa Bay as ours is going to be run directly by the Foundation.”
By running the program, the Lightning Foundation will be responsible for everything from equipment to ice time. Luckily it has a dedicated staff of volunteers, and Cole’s 15 years of experience as a coach, to help make the job easier.
During the first clinic, a handful of volunteer coaches could be seen on the ice helping the participants with everything from drills to just moving along the ice. Like any hockey clinic, players learned techniques like skating and stick-handling. Although some of the players may not have had the upper-body strength to push themselves, the coaches were eager to do whatever they could to help make it the most exciting experience possible.
Those efforts were not lost on participants such as Marty Quessenberry whose 3-year old son, Dylan, participated in the clinic.
To be able to put a clinic together like that, to be able to deal with a lot of different children that come in and have certain disabilities, and to manage a clinic and pull it off like David did, I thought it was fantastic,
Quessenberry said. “I think that not only Dylan, but every kid there had a blast.”
Making sure that each child has a memorable experience is obviously a priority in putting on the clinics.
Leigh admits to playfully boasting that he is now a Lightning player, and Quessenberry laughingly pointed out that his son spent the entire drive home from the clinic saying, “Hockey! Hockey!” Even Dylan’s twin brother, Ryan, who watched from the stands, excitedly pointed out that “Dylan played hockey!”
It is that kind of reaction that Cole hopes will continue at future clinics.
That’s always the best part of coaching, seeing youth, and something adults too, just really enjoying themselves,” Cole said. “You know these kids are often not able to be as active as they probably would like, and as their parents would like, because of their physical challenges. To see them out there and having a great time, having a blast and learning some skills is perfect. It’s the perfect thing.
“These kids are either confined to wheelchairs or have some difficulty walking,” Quessenberry said. “Being out there in an environment like that, being in the sled and just kind of cruising along the ice and free-flowing around, I don’t think a lot of them have experienced something like that before. Then you add in a $155 million facility, home of the champion Tampa Bay Lightning, and it makes a huge difference. It makes a huge impact on a kid to be out there.
“From the start to the end of the clinic when we left, all of the different things we did out there, I think for those kids it just made their day.”
While having fun is a purpose of the clinic, it’s also about helping teach participants life skills. From building strength to self esteem to the ability to be more social, the program hopes to create a team environment which the children can call their own and identify with.
As someone who experienced the importance of a team atmosphere firsthand, Leigh wants to make sure that everyone involved in the program gets the opportunities he had to seek out.
“The reason I was doing this program was to get the community to know about it, to get people to play,” Leigh said. “I’m happy that people like Marty and Dylan are able to go out there. I hope that he [Dylan] never remembers life before sled hockey, that all he thinks about is that there was sled hockey.
I remember that life before sled hockey and it was a challenge, because you’re thinking just because I’m disabled, just because I’m physically challenged, I can’t play hockey? I hope he always has this program.”
Giving a child, or any disabled athlete, an opportunity to do something they never thought they would be able to do is one of the most rewarding results of the program for all of those involved.
As the Lightning Foundation and Fan Development groups continue to work together to develop the sled hockey program, they hope to give many more disabled athletes the opportunity to feel the cold air of the rink blow by their faces. And while it may seem like a simple pleasure, the laughs coming from the rink on a Sunday afternoon tell that it’s a much bigger story than that.
Courtesy: Tampa Bay Lightning
