Rediscovering a favorite pastime

Austin Wells, Editor

(ROCKWALL, TX – March 24, 2017) It’s March and sports fans everywhere know what that means: March Madness!!! Well, maybe that’s what it means for many who love college basketball. Me? I’ve caught hockey fever.

There’s less than 10 games left in the NHL regular season, and the playoff race is getting very tight. It’ll come down to the last game or two for those in the hunt. I like to keep track of my local team, the Dallas Stars, but unfortunately this season has been quite a rough go for them. They currently sit three spots back of the last playoff spot in the Western Conference at 69 points, a whole 16 points behind the Nashville Predators who claim that last wild card seat (for now anyways) at 85 points. Right on the Preds’ heels are the Los Angeles Kings (77 points) and the Winnipeg Jets (73 points). Of those teams, all but Winnipeg have nine games left (Winnipeg has eight). So essentially that would mean the Stars would have to win out the rest of their games while the rest of those teams lose most or all of their remaining games, which is highly unlikely, maybe even impossible. Bummer.

I don’t only keep track of the Stars though. I generally just like to watch the game being played at a high level. It brings me back to the days of my childhood in Heath, when on many an afternoon one could find all of us neighborhood kids with sticks in hands and donning sweaters of various NHL teams playing a good ole fashioned game of street hockey. We would set up the nets right in the middle of our neighborhood street because back in those days it wasn’t as heavily trafficked, or rather people didn’t use it as a shortcut to get to the main road as much. There was the occasional time when a car would come along and we’d have to stop everything and move the nets and our bodies out of the way to let them pass. It wasn’t ever a big deal though; we’d just get right back to playing like nothing ever happened.

I remember my best friend at the time who lived across the street was a heck of a goaltender. He would stretch out and make these spectacular saves that had you going, “No way! How’d he stop that?!” And he wasn’t a big kid or anything either, in fact he was on the short side, but had reflexes like a cat. His love for the game was infectious, and there was rarely a time during the summer months or in the afternoons after school that he, my brother and I weren’t out in the driveway playing hockey. Often we’d play our own version of real life NHL matchups, with my neighbor in net as goalie and my brother and I as the skaters. No really, we could skate with the best of them on those rollerblades of ours when we were kids! Our neighbor the goaltender would even provide the play-by-play while he minded the net.

At some point back then we were so into hockey that we would even play it in the house without rollerblades or sticks. Instead, we’d get on our knees on the floor and use our hands as sticks. We called this “Floor Hockey” and boy was it a blast! I remember nights when our neighbor friend would stay over and we’d play that for hours while watching a game on TV.

These past few days I had the pleasure to see the son of Richard and Dawn Redig – the owners of BRN who are like a second family to me – play hockey at the Dr. Pepper StarCenter in Euless. Dylan plays defense for the Raiders Youth Hockey Team of the Richardson-Rockwall High School Hockey Association. He wears number 22 and his team nickname is “Deuce.” The Raiders had a playoff game on Tuesday and won 6-3, which advanced them to the next round in a game on Wednesday. That was a hard-fought contest with lots of hits, and they came from behind to win in overtime to advance to the championship! With their Captain defenseman unable to play due to an injury he suffered in the previous game, the Raiders played their hearts out but ended up falling 2-0 in the championship game. While that was the last ever game of Dylan’s 10-year hockey career, as he has decided not to pursue it in college, he did win an Academic Award from his team! I’m very glad I got to watch him play his last games (and of course take photos of him in action).

It’s funny how things come back full circle sometimes. As I got older and started getting into other sports, hockey went from being my favorite thing in the world to just a childhood pastime. But having recently been watching the NHL and getting to see Dylan play this past week, I feel somewhat like I’ve rediscovered my love for the game. I may not play street hockey or floor hockey anymore, but I still enjoy watching it any chance I get.

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