Lifelongbender

Hey, for what it's worth I heard this morning that Rostraver has ice again. Good news for the local hockey scene.

It's amazing to me in this day and age that we can't get updates on games in some reasonably quick manner. I could understand a short delay for a sort of quality assurance review, but it seems that, especially where there are official league scorekeepers (as there are in PIHL games, at least in the regular season) there shouldn't be any barrier to very quick website updates. I don't need in-progress updates of games, but for tournaments you want to know these things. I have never been able to understand why amateur tournaments don't provide these updates, either. It would make it much easier for teams to know when and where to be for consolation/championship games and the like.

I know that Mon Valley teams are actively pursuing scrimmages and are definitely planning to play this season. So that's very good news.

Off-season? What's that? Seriously, though, Kirk Nevin and Belmont were both renovated nicely. Hess was in desperate need of an upgrade and I have heard it's moving in the right direction. I was just at the Frozen Pond over the weekend, and while the boards and front areas are much improved, the locker rooms are still the same, as is the insulation in the roof (which is pockmarked with pucks of old and might be a feature of the decor now and not an issue in and of itself), and I wonder myself about the ice making machinery. As for Rostraver, Kraft spent a good deal of money on lighting there. Regarding the owners of ice rinks raking in money - it seems that owning an ice rink is likely not a high profit enterprise. If it were, there'd probably be much more ice in the region, given the explosive growth youth hockey experienced in the early years of the 2000s. Instead, several of the 'second generation' rinks (when I was a kid we had Mt. Lebo and Rostraver, and South Park when it was winter, in the South Hills, and played much of our hockey on Canonsburg Lake) in the area have changed hands at least once recently, and Bladerunners in Bethel Park became a YMCA, of all things, with only one sheet of ice. I'd speculate, like sadday did above, that rinks are not high margin operations, for the most part.

Holy cow that sounds like a serious couple of games to watch.

I heard this, too. Recent word is that Belmont hopes to be back up in October, but they're not 100% sure they'll be able to have a season at all. Same goes with Rostraver, if what I heard is correct. This is a tough situation for those organizations, and for hockey in SW Pennsylvania in general. The area already doesn't have enough ice to go around.

As usual.

Exactly. These rules are intended to reduce the number of whistles most of the time. For old guys.

Ditto about the roughing call. I haven't seen any action at all on the banging to boards issue, but they're definitely calling the roughing thing, at least in my area.

I mostly agree with this. There are plenty of parents who shop around looking for the 'highest' team for their kids. It's often based upon misperceptions about the skill of their player, but not always. In any case, the proliferation of AAA and independent teams is largely due to this phenomenon. It doesn't help that there are some high-end organizations that will take anyone willing to pay, especially at the younger ages, in order to partially fund their top teams. Lots of Pittsburgh area parents have been suckered by this practice, and it's really hurting girls hockey in particular around here right now.

I don't either. I think it's very uncommon. Most kids at this age would want the additional ice in preparation for JV or varsity.

I'd come and watch those games, too. No matter who won, they'd be barn burners.

I'm guessing that the Predators have parents who read this board, too! Have to say that going the the trouble of closing practice - especially closing practices to parents - at a rink like the Ice Castle is a bit fishy.

Sigh. Neither of my kids play for the Predators. But I know some of the ones who are on this list. I coached one when he was a squirt. For the record, it's not obvious to me that it's a AAA level talent pool. It's just that the kids I know on there are good players.

If that's the roster for the team, I see a few pretty strong players on there, too. Wouldn't be surprised if it was very expensive, though.

Seconded!

So is this all part of a larger question about whether kids should be allowed to play contact sports at all? I mean, hockey seems on the surface to be less damaging to the body than, for instance, football. What about the issues with repeated blows to the head from heading the ball in soccer? Where is the proper balance between the physical play that is such a big part of the sport we all love and protection against injuries? For my part, checking is a substantial part of the game and it is worth the risk of injuries to those who choose to play it. However, I also believe that there are a great many coaches - probably the vast majority, actually - who spend little time on teaching fundamentally correct checking. There are also plenty (though, I think, fewer) who passively encourage needlessly violent and/or dirty hits by not responding to their players when they see those hits. There are organizations in every city famous for not teaching checking properly. I think checking is important, but I also think we as coaches and parents need to do a far better job of teaching the hows (and, crucially, WHYs) of checking, and enforcing good sportsmanship and respect for the opposing players. The inevitable end result is going to be phasing out checking for all but the elite players. This writing is on the wall. We all play in beer leagues, where body checking is illegal, and we all know that hockey is still an awesome game in non-checking environments, but I still think that eliminating body checking for most youth players will be a sad outcome. (Again, my inner biases at work.)

Actually, when I heard that PAHL might be considering making a change along the lines of eliminating more body checking, I did a bunch of research about it. Most of the research on this has been conducted, unsurprisingly, by Canadian universities. This quote is from one of the studies I found (and yes, I admit it's just one study, but their findings were typical): "It has been posited that learning to body check at a younger age might somehow protect players from injuries related to body checking at older ages. The literature, however, does not support this (McPherson, Rothman & Howard, 2006). A further comparison between Bantam minor hockey players from Quebec (no previous body checking experience) and Alberta (2 years of body checking experience) revealed a similar rate of injury in both groups in their first year of Bantam (Emery and Kang et al., 2011; McLaughlin, 2011). In addition, the rates of injury for the Bantam players in Quebec were similar to those of the Alberta players in their first year of body checking, suggesting that regardless of when body checking is introduced there will be a spike in injuries sustained. In a breakdown of injuries sustained, there was no difference between the groups in terms of concussions, severe injury or severe concussions. Contrary to common misconceptions, introducing body checking at an older age (Bantam) when players are larger, faster, and size discrepancies may be greater does not result in significantly increased rates of injury nor does it result in more severe injury." Both set of emphases were bold in the original text. Note that, at the time the report was produced, PeeWees were permitted to body check in Alberta, but in Quebec body checking started at Bantams. The full report is available here: https://www.hockeycalgary.ca/assets/file/BC Final Report.pdf Now, in my my heart I actually agree with the logic that starting body checking earlier makes for more prepared players, as I argued above, but it appears from the data that injuries as a whole are not affected by starting earlier (or later, for that matter). I admit that I find these results entirely non-intuitive, but that's what the report prepared for Hockey Calgary found from the data. It's a complex issue. I honestly can't help but wonder if my own beliefs on this are skewed entirely by my experiences and biases on it.

Eddie, I know a good number of parents who took this step, too. What a shame.

They're banning body checking for lower level players - in our area, comparable to B and probably some of our A minor players - at the bantam and even midget level all across Canada. See this for some background: https://globalnews.ca/news/5281991/bodychecking-minor-hockey-regina-saskatoon/ For the record, I heard that there was talk in a few PAHL meetings last year about experimenting with eliminating body checking for B teams in this area. I guess it was tabled. Personally, I believe that body checking is a vital part of the game. While I'd agree that there can be some debate about what age checking should be introduced, it seems to me that if you're going to permit body checking at any age/level, you've got to introduce it early enough that kids can get ready for it before they're JV players. At that time it's entirely too late, in my view. Just by way of example, our local JV team has a player who is in 10th grade this season, is 6'3" and almost 220 lb. If he lines up a Freshman who is on the early side of the BY, it's possible that you could have a kid that size who's been playing checking hockey for three years, two at the JV level, hitting a kid who was only just introduced to checking. At this age level the size differences are enormous in some cases and a kid that big could be hitting a 5'6", 150lb forward who hasn't really been extensively prepared for it. That just feels wrong to me. People will say that there are serious size differences in peewee, and argue that checking should be restricted there for that reason, but my thought is that the varying level of experience with hitting is a serious problem at the first year or two, and in JV/Varsity it's entirely possible to find seniors who've been playing full contact checking hockey for five or six years on the ice with kids who have less than a year experience with it. That strikes me as worse than a big peewee hitting a small one. If they're going to allow full contact checking in high school hockey, then restricting it to bantams makes little sense to me. And now that I am reading sample39's post, it seems to me that I just long-windedly restated his position. But I spent all this time typing, so I'm going to post it anyway!

There is no body checking, but as Jack Handey noted above, most of the players are bantams who body check in amateur hockey. U12 parents whose players want to play middle school have to sign a waiver because of this. My son played middle school in sixth grade, but that was a few years ago and things have changed.

"Western PA does not need anymore closing rinks." Exactly right.

And probably also significantly lessen the hostility.

I'd seen that, and heard it, too, but someone who is in a position to know told me what I said above. Of course, until we see what happens in reality it's all speculation and rumor. In any case there is no good way to get vehicles into, or out of, the complex in any number, like what would happen at the end of a game/practice slot, either. It's a cool old building, but I personally can't see any way they can make it work with the neighborhood. Be happy to play there, I guess, but I just have my doubts.

It is still intended to happen, but no date has been set for breaking ground. At one point there was talk about putting some parking under roof there since the building is really huge, but that has apparently been nixed. As of now it seems they are thinking that parking will have to happen in local garages and on the streets. Not only will parking be a nightmare, but I have to think the local residents are going to come to hate the rink because of these issues. The closest garage is actually across the busway, and also serves the Whole Foods complex.