Some kids have ‘goals’ beyond hockey

By RON BROCHU

If hockey jive was money, Duluth would have streets paved with gold. This time of year, there’s never a shortage of puck chat – so much so that it begs a question: Is hockey a sport or an obsession?

Whoa! Are we going to tread on holy turf? Yep.

That thought came to mind Sunday when a Duluth News Tribune cover story lamented the drop in local youth hockey participation. The player count has declined 36 percent compared with 1998, the article said. What has this world come to?

Given the public and private money being invested in Duluth hockey facilities, including those for youth and college, the decline obviously is a big deal – at least in some circles. After all, some hockey enthusiasts have described the sport and new indoor rinks as the savior of youth – the community’s outreach effort to save kids from a life of crime, dope and a plethora of negative influences that range all the way to public skateboarding.

That argument sounds great until you add up the numbers. Enrollment in local schools – including District 709, charter and private facilities – adds up to roughly 11,500 kids. With 680 kids participating in Duluth hockey league programs, the sport serves just 5.9 percent of the young community. Even if the program had retained its former strength, it would serve just one out of every 10 kids, which doesn’t exactly christen it as the generation’s last great hope – not even up here in the Great White North.

By now, some of you think this is an exercise in bashing hockey. That, however, is not so. It’s a keen game of skill that’s actually much more fun to play than to watch. Those who do it well deserve respect.

But as a youth sport, hockey has advanced far beyond its status as a game, becoming an overly competitive endeavor promoted more by parents than students. One key point not mentioned in the weekend article, perhaps because it borders on blasphemy, is the burnout among players. Some are chucking the whole routine despite, and because of, the massive personal investment.

League hockey involves years of early practices, late practices, week night and weekend games, local travel, regional travel, summer camps – all sandwiched between classes, homework and summer jobs. Does this sound like a youth sport, or is it closer to a semi-pro recruiting mechanism that ultimately filters out 99.9 percent of all participants. Truth be told, very few kids advance to the pros – or even Division 1.

This seldom-addressed phenomenon was first brought to my attention about 15 ago by a hockey dad who spent years carting his son’s traveling team throughout the area. Out of nowhere, the boy quit the sport as a high school junior, providing a simple explanation: It was too much. He was tired of the grind. He had other “goals” in life including, of all the weird things, education. Although the kid was relieved, the father was crushed. What now?

He wasn’t the first dad to share that scenario over the years, including some who were coaches. A few actually confessed the game is far too demanding of young persons, at least as a league sport.

A couple decades back, a Milwaukee Journal columnist, whose name I can’t remember, addressed the stark change he had observed while covering youth sports over the years. He experienced an epiphany one day while taking a short walk past a sandlot baseball game. He noticed the kids were cheering, laughing and visibly having fun. Their behavior represented a stark difference from what he saw when covering league sports. During league games, aggressive coaches and parents constantly barked orders at the players – demanding they win. And the players’ demeanor mimicked that of their mentors. They were not laughing, not smiling. There was no clear indication they were having a good time.

This raises the question of whether we need to worry because participation has declined in Duluth youth hockey. If kids are worried, maybe it’s a big deal.
Notably, the weekend DNT story did not include any player input. But if the concern is only among parents, as it appears, then it’s time to review who the program really serves. Is it a game that kids truly crave, or are parents molding their offspring into clones through which they vicariously relive their own past?

Ron Brochu occasionally plays a game of hockey with geezers who thereafter require lots of physical therapy.

Published in the Oct. 10, 2008 Reader Weekly