Youth hockey thread

[Bruwinz37]

Not sure if there is any interest in a thread like this.....but I will give it a try. Any hockey parents out there navigating the waters of youth hockey? Tournaments planned for the year? Share away.....

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[beth]

My daughter is a PeeWee (house) this year, and I'm asst coach for her team. I think it will be a fun year - we have some really great kids and parents. Hopefully there will be little drama!

 

[redbranch]

My son is a first year Mite; my wife and I are the hockey parents for the team. definitely a crash course into the world of hockey and kids sports. We have our Jamboree this coming weekend

 

[LateNightOilerFan]

Sigh. My son is entering his final year of youth hockey. We've gone from Timbits & Novice to Atom & PeeWee house league, to Bantam & Midget rep teams in minor, with spring & summer hockey leagues & camps tossed in, and now ending with AAA High School.

Enjoy the ride folks, there will be ups and downs, highs and lows, some frustrations and heartbreakers and some pure joy, but overall lots of pride, life lessons, fun, friendships and hopefully lots of good memories for both you and your kids.

Enjoy the season!

 

[BigDuke6]

This is my son's first year playing travel. He's a Squirt so the kids are all still pretty young (8-10). I will say that I was dreading the cost, and time committment, but so far I'm really enjoying it. We have a good group of parents for the most part. I can't say it is the best coaching in the world, but it is a young team, and the coaches have a very tough job.

They just wrapped up their preseason, and are destined to be a B team, which is appropriate. My biggest frustration so far is my son's effort. When he gives it his all he can be a difference maker, those instances just aren't frequent, and you never know when it is going to happen.

 

[redbranch]

That's pretty common from what I can see BigDuke6; my son is either a ball of fire, or a dud. not a ton in between I don't sweat it. Encourage him when he puts the effort in, don't get negative when he doesn't. I've noticed my sons "on" moments are becomming more frequent as he starts to understand how this whole sports thing works. And he loves getting acknowledgement from the coaches

 

[Bruwinz37]

My son is a first year Mite; my wife and I are the hockey parents for the team. definitely a crash course into the world of hockey and kids sports. We have our Jamboree this coming weekend

My son is a squirt minor and plays at a very high level and believe me I long for the days of cross ice jamborees and 6 year old hockey. Mites are truly the best of times.....yes, I love watching him play at a high level now and all the hard work paying off but those days where he was just learning the game I would love to get back. Enjoy it.

 

[Bruwinz37]

Anyone here ever had their kids play in the Whitby Silver Stick tournament? If so...any feedback on it?

 

[redbranch]

My son is a squirt minor and plays at a very high level and believe me I long for the days of cross ice jamborees and 6 year old hockey. Mites are truly the best of times.....yes, I love watching him play at a high level now and all the hard work paying off but those days where he was just learning the game I would love to get back. Enjoy it.

We do really enjoy it. The kids are awesome, and its such a joy to see their faces when something clicks. The kids have the right attitude on the ice, and my son shrugs off a loss the moment his skates cross the threshhold. Now the parents....

 

[Wilch]

I was just wondering, how do you guys keep up with all the early morning practices? Must take a huge toll on you.

 

[Bruwinz37]

I was just wondering, how do you guys keep up with all the early morning practices? Must take a huge toll on you.

Not at all...I love it. No place I would rather be than at a rink.

 

[TieClark]

I was just wondering, how do you guys keep up with all the early morning practices? Must take a huge toll on you.

It takes a certain kind of person for sure... my dad never had a problem with it, my mom on the other hand couldn't do it

 

[beth]

I was just wondering, how do you guys keep up with all the early morning practices? Must take a huge toll on you.

Ours are at 6 in the evening.

 

[SauceHockey]

I play Midget AA so I am still in youth/minor hockey :/

 

[LateNightOilerFan]

I was just wondering, how do you guys keep up with all the early morning practices? Must take a huge toll on you.

Generally as my son got older, the practices got to be a more reasonable time. Also, usually there was a rotation amongst teams so it wasn't always 6am practices all the time. It might vary in different minor hockey leagues though.

Anyway, I never minded it too much. It was always funny driving in to the rink in the dark and our son would be in the back seat chirping up saying, "Look! The lights are on in that house, they must be getting ready to go play hockey too!" He loved early morning practices, in fact still does - nothing better than stepping onto clean, dry ice and not having to wait for the zamboni to finish up.

 

[redbranch]

My son's mites practices are 6 pm during the week, and weekend practices are 7 am. His games go as early as 6:30 am.

On one side, it's a pain in the can to get up, get a distracted and half awake kid up and in gear, at the ice 10 min before start time, especially games that are 40 min away.

On the other hand, it's nice during the weekend to kind of get it done right away, and still have my weekend. the 2-3 pm games kinda suck, because it's right in the middle.

The 6 pm practices take a bit of logistics because my wife and I both work, so we get out, run to school, grab kid, and just make it on time

 

[CornKicker]

my oldest started the timbit program last year and this year will be the 2nd, i am the coach and its awesome. the kids are so excited to be on the ice and it is refrshing to see the love of the game at such a basic innocent level. makes you appreciate the years i have played.

 

[Wilch]

Kinda sucks that schools in my district don't organize this kind of stuff. Would be nice if they could just round everyone up on a school bus.

They have it for everything but ice hockey.

 

[pelts35.com]

My son is a first year Mite; my wife and I are the hockey parents for the team. definitely a crash course into the world of hockey and kids sports. We have our Jamboree this coming weekend

What rink does your son play out of? I'm assuming the jamboree that you are referring to was in Aston? I was there with my first year mite son as well. 2 long days!

 

[redbranch]

My son plays out of ProtecHockey in somerset NJ. Our jamboree was at the Ice Vault in Wayne.

Yeah, those Jamborees are long, but it was fun, the kids had a great time, and slept like the dead those nights

 

[pelts35.com]

My son plays out of ProtecHockey in somerset NJ. Our jamboree was at the Ice Vault in Wayne.

Yeah, those Jamborees are long, but it was fun, the kids had a great time, and slept like the dead those nights

Our kids had a blast. We had enough time between games on Saturday that we did a team outing to see Hotel Transylvania.

 

[redbranch]

yeah, we had a lovely 5 hour break between sets of games

 

[pelts35.com]

yeah, we had a lovely 5 hour break between sets of games

Breakfast and a movie!

 

[redbranch]

we opted for breakfast and a nap

 

[BigDuke6]

One of my biggest frustations has been that the game schedule has been very fluid. We had a four game preseason during September, that changed twice I think. The regular season starts this weekend and we just got the information on our first game today (Wed.). We don't have any other schedule information.

We have to drive upwards of 2 1/2 hours to get to some of these games. Thankfully this Sunday's game is a home game.