HighSchoolHockeyForums.com

Good story today on the rebuilding of Minneapolis hockey:

http://www.kstp.com/index.shtml?articleID=193681

Great to hear about the mite numbers, but as you know, the majority of the top city players do not go to public schools, and that is a the main reason a city school will not make it back the the state tournament.

Are those the Mpls Park numbers with Washburn, Southwest, Roosevelt,
Richfield, City of the Lakes, St. Louis Park? Not bad maybe you could add Edina, Bloomington Kenedy and Jefferson and maybe you could make 1000. You guys have a sucess story but it will start to eat away from inside hence St. Louis park pulling out.

Those are south minneapolis numbers. Approx. 80% of those numbers come from an area half the size of Edina in the Southwest and Washburn areas, with the balance coming from Roosevelt/South neighborhoods.

City of Lakes has their own numbers, approximately 20-30 mites up in the Edison area. Dinomights and New Directions also have 30-40.

Saint Louis Park and Richfield have their own mite programs and are not included. Saint Louis Park also skates their own squirt program to keep younger kids closer to the community.

We are co-oped with Saint Louis Park at Peewees, Bantams and all girls levels. Richfield provides a handful of players at our upper levels with the majority going to other associations (Kennedy, for instance). I have not heard that Saint Louis Park is pulling out of the co-op at these other levels so can't speak to that.

This topic has been a getting quite a bit of press as of late. Additionally, there was a story aired Thursday night during the HS Tournament. That story was certainly less flattering, and didn't acknowledge any of the advancements that the Minneapolis youth hockey association has made. There have been many posts on this board as well; part of the issue, it seems, is that people are conflating the youth association program with the high school programs. While there are certainly links between youth and high school programs, they have very different dynamics and drivers and should be addressed separately.

Most troubling are the weak and frankly incorrect assumptions many commentators have made relative to Minneapolis (and St. Paul for that matter) hockey. The story is always the same: a shifting/declining demographic has put the sport out of the reach for city folk, apathy on behalf of the kids, no one playing park/pond hockey, a culture that doesn't support the sport, glory days gone, etc., etc. This reasoning is wrong on the face.

Demographics: The core neighborhoods that Mpls hockey pulls from are some of the most affluent in the metro (Kenwood, Isles, Lynnhurst, Tangletown, Linden Hills, etc.). The subtext of the demographics argument is that the sport isn't affordable to the community, which clearly isn't universal here. However, let's all acknowledge that the economics and cost of hockey is a hindrance to the overall growth of the sport. The arms race to get the latest equipment (gotta have those Total 1's), offseason clinics, triple AAA, tournament travel, etc. inflates every year. This cost burden isn't endemic to Minneapolis kids alone, and clearly prevents a number of kids from every community to pursue the sport. The economics of the sport is something that needs to be addressed collectively; and there's been a real lack of creative solutions. The Herb Brooks Foundation, led by Herb's philosophy, has put forward some of the few effective programs to address this matter: free clinics, after-school rink rats programs, etc. Other communities should follow this lead.

Culture: hockey has been eclipsed by Nascar as the 4th major sport. Again, this isn't a problem strictly to Minneapolis communities. Playing hockey used to be a birthright to Minnesota kids, and almost a forgone conclusion. While overall hockey participation numbers are strong, I would bet that participation rates relative to our overall population are off from past peaks (association enrollment numbers wouldn't tell the whole story here). Anecdotally, with the growth of soccer, rugby, snowboarding, etc., we know fewer kids are committed to the sport of hockey. I believe this is a problem of inclusion: the associations just don't reach out to the communities like they used to, and do little to market the sport to groups outside of the core target audience. Again, the Herb Brooks Foundation programs are fresh perspective here, and you can see kids involved that wouldn't have otherwise thought twice about our sport. Minneapolis has addressed this in a manner few other communities have.

Pond hockey: every story about the purported decline of Minneapolis hockey is backed up with commentator statements that outdoor park rinks are closing left and right, and that the few struggling rinks still open are barren. Have these folks bothered to get out to the rinks themselves? I did. My son and I went 2-3 times a week this winter, and there was always action on the ice and pick-up games. The kids are alright! If anything, I suspect that the local outdoor rink/pond hockey culture is as strong in Minneapolis communities as anywhere.

This is not to say that Minneapolis hockey isn't without challenges; certainly, there are many. However, these challenges aren't unique to the city, and are unfortunate aspects of the structure of the sport overall. As SWPrez has noted, Minneapolis Storm enrollment number are strong (140 or so Mighty Mites alone), and the upper level teams have measured a good bit of success. As such, the question shouldn't be "what's wrong with city (Minneapolis or St. Paul) hockey??", but rather what can we do collectively to address the challenges faced by our sport!

The struggles of Mpls HS hockey, that's another story...

I've seen several of these stories, but the reality is it seems like nearly all of the higher quality Bantam A's from Mpls Park Storm and often BB1's that live in Minneapolis are kids that go to Breck, Blake, or Benilde or even the Holy Angels. Not too many of them playing for Minneapolis West and going to Southwest or Washburn.

I believe the SW President's kid goes to Benilde as well so unless some of the better players are attracted to save parents money and go to Southwest or Washburn or South, the HS programs that are left (East or West) won't get any better. Tom Younghans coaches Mpls West, but except for one kid (Newt Fuller) I don't think any other Bantam A kid went to a Mpls school from the Mpls Park Bantam A Storm. A few are at SLP that are Park kids.