Hockey Skatin' on in

All children dread the month of August. We all know it's because of one thing: school. If you're a true hockey player, you'll be ecstatic for the 8th month of the year. This of course means hockey season starts! There's absolutely nothing greater than a start of a new season. You meet new teammates (which of course means making new friends), possibly meeting a new coach, learning new things and much more.

My favorite part of the new season is improving your game, both physically and mentally. As the year goes on, you improve your strength during dry land, practice and even in games. It's quite easy to see your improvements because with my team, we do testing during three parts of the season: the beginning, the middle and the end. It's an assortment of physical tests that include agility, endurance, and much more. So as the year goes on, it's inspiring to see how much you and other teammates have improved during the year. Not only does a hockey player develop physically, but he or she usually develops mentally as well. As easy as hockey seems, it's really not at all. There are multiple strategies  to hockey, and each and every one of them is quite challenging to accomplish. So as you get older, you must be able to play your position and be situationally aware at all times. You have to be able to be in the right place at the right time. So with the excitement of the beginning of the season, I'm quite excited to start improving on my game both mentally and physically.

So far the Utah Jr. Grizzlies have played in one tournament. It was in Colorado and it was called the Early Bird Tournament and it was hosted by the Arapahoe Warriors. We didn't place in the tournament and ended up going 1-3. For the first tournament, we truly weren't too bad. Our next tournament is in Boise, Idaho in less than 48 hours. We will be playing teams from across the West Coast and I'm quite excited to play.

So far my team has played seven games, four of which were tournament play. We have won four of our seven games. This year I currently have eight points, with two of them being goals and six being assists. For a right wing, this isn't bad for seven games, but I could do better. The highest point maker(s) so far this year has been Tomas Macunias and Zach Jerome with eleven points each. They're my line mates and we've created a total of thirty points in seven games. I hope my team does well this weekend. Hopefully I can help out as well.

Utah Jr. Grizzlies AA/AAA 2014-15 Season