Blackhawk’s hockey team had some impressive records in the history books by making it to playoffs for the last ten years, but this year, they were presented with some struggles. As they approach the mid season, playoffs have been on the minds of many.
“I think the big thing for us is that we are starting to play better as a team. We graduated 13 seniors last year. This put us in a spot; we had a lot of kids that haven’t played before coming together. They are starting to play better and as the season progressed, but we still need to find out what it takes to win a hockey game,” head coach Doug Schaefer explained.
According to Schaefer, the team has shown signs of progression and unification. He explains that the main struggle they have faced is being a young team. He stated that there are seven freshmen and it can be intimidating being that young and playing in both a starting and key role on a varsity team.
Not only is the team young, but there are some players that look to have little motivation to improve, according to Schaefer.
“It’s a hard situation because every player has a different way that they are motivated. As a coach, it is struggling to find what’s the right kind of button that I need to push to do this [get improvement],” Schaefer commented.
Junior Jimmy Kelly expressed that his team needs to start giving their full effort and start caring more and once they start to care and give their full potential, then they will have a shot at the playoffs.
Knowing what the team needs to do is one thing, but will it get done?
“Change has already been happening,” Schaefer said.
Schaefer elaborated on the past few months and how it was rough having a short bench. This is because, as a coach, he felt that he was forced to roll kids out onto the ice.
With that, he also expressed that some kids had looked at it as “oh, it doesn’t matter, I have to play because you can’t play just one line.” One of Blackhawk’s defensemen, John Malagise, has returned to the scene after being out for six weeks. This will change some athlete’s playing time. Now, having their fourth defenseman and three full lines, the players will now have to earn their playing time.
Blackhawk is carrying a 2-8-1 record with them. The playoffs contain the top six teams in each division. The team continues to sit in the seventh spot for playoffs, which means they need to continue to win in order to move up to sixth.
Looking ahead, the Blackhawk hockey team will face many new challenges. Many of the teams will have improved from the beginning of the season, and the fight for playoff positions will continue. Blackhawk looks to put in more heart and effort so they earn their spot after the first round of playoffs.