#82 - Punk Rock Hockey

Punk Rock Hockey

2/26/06 (#82)

I watched my first women's hockey match last week, the US Olympic team playing the Swiss national team. I also watched my second one, Canada vs. Italy. And my third, Canada vs. Russia. Much to the chagrin of my daughter (who prefers a visual salad of mixed animations), I watched every game that was aired while we were home. These women got game!

Hockey is a wonderful combination of grace and power, of finesse and force. I grew up in the house of a Boston Bruins fan, so I was reared on the National Hockey League, and that house was in New England, where most every neighborhood has a frozen pond big enough for pick-up games. I played Midget and Bantam hockey in my teens (the Pop Warner of hockey in my area), leagues that attracted the city's best hockey players as well as folks like me, the guy about whom phrases such as "He has so much heart" and "No one works harder" are delivered in a conciliatory manner, since compliments on goals and assists would be purely sarcastic. (I was forever battling a pint-sized blond kid for the dishonor of "worst kid on the team", a private competition pathetique in which we were both the loser.) Despite how my skill refute this fact, I grew up with hockey, and the rabid enthusiasm that my Dad possessed while watching the 1970 Bruins survived another genetic mutation and lives on within me. I have other television vices more demanding, so I rarely reawaken that interest, but this has been a fun week of hockey.

In my youth, the sport seemed a bit different---helmets were optional, and most teams were comprised of various "role players"---there were pure players like Bobby Orr, or scorers like Phil Esposito, but there were also the enforcers---if an opposing player opted to take a cheap shot at Orr, or for that matter a hard, clean check, you knew that the next line shift was going to bring out a 6'5" bruiser whose sole mission was to wait for that player to get the puck so that he could flatten the bastard against the boards, a reminder that you do not hit Bobby Orr. I recall it being an extremely physical game, like football without the breaks in play for huddles and hikes and out-of bounds balls. It might still be like that today (I haven't watched an NHL game in years) but at least now, helmets are required.

The women play with one enormously significant difference from the men's game---hitting is forbidden: various types of checks translate to various types of penalties. At first, this struck me as contradictory to the cause---liking winning the right to vote, but finding your ballot features only half of the candidates. But rather than merely removing a crucial element of the game, this change accentuates the strategic aspects of the game, closer to soccer on ice than football on ice. If a player gets a pass, they don't need to worry about getting pummeled, so they can control the puck and play with improved foresight. (Mind you, there's still a lot of physical contact---pads are still required.)

With the absence of brutality, the strategy and finesse of the sport is accentuated. At this level of play (literally, the best female players in world), those who have made it are not merely the best skaters or puck handlers, but those who are smartest---who can read defenses, who can precipitate a complex series of passes on a 3-on-1 breakaway, and then immediately react and respond if things don't go as planned. (After all, the defensemen* are anticipating a complex series of passes as well.) Team USA is populated with many college All-Americans, the best and brightest of the sport, most of whom have been playing since they were 5 years old. These women are all thinking the game at every minute: anticipating, reacting, overpowering, and outplaying. (Except against Sweden, to whom they lost in a dramatic double-overtime shootout---astonishingly, the first game in over 200 matches in which the US lost to anyone except perennial co-powerhouse Canada. Canada has still lost no games except to the US squad, and return home with the Gold this week. The Americans come home with the bronze.)

But that's not why I love them. They won my heart because every player, for every nation's team, almost every time one was offered a microphone, talked about what is good for the sport, what is fun for the fans, and most importantly, the role they play in encouraging girls to play the sport. It was the mantra of their public statements, and it exuded a positive outlook that was free of vanity. I don't recall the last time, if ever, that I heard a male athlete say, "If this makes just one boy sitting in the audience feel inspired to play, that's the best payoff for me." Pro sports is a business, and is approached as such by young hopefuls---we don't need to encourage boys to play basketball, we need to encourage them to be realistic about their chances of being superstars.

The enthusiasm with which these women talked about their fans was immediately reminiscent of another recent championship level team, the United States Women's soccer team. As the documentary Dare to Dream showed, the women on that team refused to define a line between the fans and the players---it would be corny and crass if done for effect, but they are so obviously genuine that it's infectious, a self-perpetuating energy that leaves all involved energized. The hockey women share that energy.

An ad for Nike that aired during the games featured US skier Bode Miller lamenting the state of sports in America, particularly the attitude that if you can't be the best, you shouldn't bother to play. The women's hockey league doesn't seem to suffer from that mindset---they encourage everyone to play, to strive, and to enjoy the great game of hockey.

And isn't that exactly what punk rock attempted and achieved? Eliminate the line between stage and audience, don't play FOR the people, play with the people. Punk rock put the music into untrained hands, to stumble into joyful and snarling noise, to grow not by studying but by doing. The punk rock ethos is, you can do this---punk rock made so many rush out and buy a cheap guitar and start playing. I got that exact same feeling from the Olympic tournament---most of the sports were mere spectator events, but after every women's hockey game, I ached to rush out and buy cheap pair of skates and get playing.

©2006 wpreagan

* The language of women's hockey is the same as in men's---there are no defensewomen, or defensepersons. One of the Olympic commentators, who herself played on the first US Women's Olympic team, said that the women embrace this because "defenseman" is a hockey term, not a gender designation. Too many men on the ice? Stop worrying about semantics and get that extra player back to the bench.