An Afternoon With The Ladies, Forechecking Required

By Stephanie Morgan
Columbus Wired Columnist
12/30/02

Each Wednesday and Friday afternoon at the Dublin Chiller, a group of moms arrive to repeat the same story. It’s hockey practice for a group of beginners under the tutelage of Coaches Pat Murphy and Rob Schriner. There are lessons in skating, forechecking, passing and defensive zone drops. There are scrimmages and hockey is learned.

Only in this case, the kids are left to stand outside the rink and tell the younger ones, “you can’t right now, Mommy’s out on the ice.”

Nearly a year ago, Leslie Young, who was already a defender in the recreational male leagues, began talking with other hockey moms. A bone fide hockey mom herself (Travis, 13, will be attending Goalie Camp in Ottawa this summer), she found a common desire for moms to learn more about the sport their kids enjoyed.

Leslie, along with friend Lisa Tugnutt (you might remember her husband who now tends for Dallas) took the conversation one step further – they enlisted the help of Pat Murphy. Pat Murphy was coaching the majority of the kids and was largely regarded as kind, patient teacher.

And so the Chiller Mom’s Hockey Program was formed. The program began with only 5 or 6 women playing, but word of mouth has brought nearly 30 regulars to the program.

Pat Murphy’s coaching style was supplemented by the verbose sty lings of Rob Schriner, a former Columbus Chill All-Star player. Where Pat is content to be the self-described “good cop” coach, it is Rob that is largely regarded as being the coach that is most deserving of the crosscheck. There will be a bit more on the Pie Incident later.

For the last year, this has been a group of women that has been able to learn more than hockey fundamentals. Speaking to Richelle Kreber, a petite mother of six (you would never believe it in a million years), the first part of a common story that echoes throughout the team emerges.

“My son plays,” she promptly explains when asked why she wanted to play hockey. “I’d never had hockey skates on in my life,” she freely offers when asked how much she knew about playing the game before starting the program.

And a year later? “Now I feel that I can tell him more about where he should be playing. “

When given a moment to reflect, Richelle feels that her son “thinks it’s pretty cool,” that she plays hockey now.
But it’s not all about playing hockey to better understand the game that the kids are playing.

Renee Hheneman tells the second part of the common story. “I had never played a sport in my life. So to have the camaraderie and locker room stuff and the fun and support has been awesome.”

And the women are a true team. I had mentioned the Pie Incident earlier, and perhaps it’s time to get back to that story.

Whereas Pat Murphy is the nice coach, there are times where Rob Schriner is the not-so-nice coach.

To classify Pat and Rob as your classic good cop/bad cop coaching team is unfair. It is obvious that they have as much fun coaching this group as the group has playing and learning.

As it is with any sport, though, there are the fun parts of learning and the not-so-fun parts of learning. Imagine skating drills that make the dreaded shuttle runs of high-school gym look like a cakewalk. Imagine that the one that makes you do this is Rob. Imagine that Rob likes to be really social just after he’s made you go through this.

That’s how you get to be the “mean coach” in the Chiller Mom’s Hockey Program.

Not that the mom’s don’t try to make things a little easier on themselves. As you hear Rob tell it, “the moms like to bring us treats. They like to think that bribery seems to work…that if they bring us sweets, and home baked goods that we’ll let up on them, but it hasn’t worked yet. But they keep trying, which we like.”

But further investigation by your intrepid reporter found that Rob doesn’t always appreciate the treats brought in by his team. It seems that Rob places a lot of emphasis is on the “home baked” part of the “bribery” that he receives. A few practices ago, there were treats, but one was not made from scratch. Apparently Rob made his preference for home made known, and was not terribly appreciative of the gesture portion of treat time.

Never mention to a hockey mom that she should have spent extra time in an already busy day baking treats for you. They don’t get angry. They get even.

Imagine two lovely pies. The first was a large homemade apple pie. The second was a homemade chocolate pie with a fantastic whipped cream topping dotted with MINI M&Ms.

Is it any surprise that Rob would go for the chocolate pie? As the women gathered round, they graciously offered Rob his pick of pies. As he struggled to cut his well-deserved chocolate pie, he began to struggle. And while the chocolate pie was certainly brown inside…it had a decidedly fibrous texture as Rob raised the first piece out of the crust.

As team members began to laugh uncontrollably, it was obvious that some of the ingredients for Renee’s Chocolate Pie had come from her own back yard – literally. Had it not been for the larger-than-normal mulch content in the pie, Rob would have been well on his way to getting his just desserts.

When talking to Leslie and Travis Young, it is obvious that this hockey team does more than just give the women a chance to learn about hockey and make more friends. When I had a chance to talk to Travis about what he was interested in, The Learning Channel’s “Junkyard Wars” and “Full Metal Challenge” were listed as favorite TV Shows.

I sat there realizing that the Henry Rollins that I knew as the young, angry singer of bands like Black Flag and the Rollins Band who was equally well-known among those of my age for his spoken-word albums was nothing but a TV show host to young Travis. The generational divide had reared its ugly head in less than ten minutes.

But then there’s hockey.

When Travis and his mom, Leslie, talk about hockey, there’s pride in her thirteen-year-old son’s voice. He’s a polite and amiable young man who answers any question put to him about his likes and dislikes. To see the pride in his face and to have him say, “she’s really good” when asked what he thinks of his mom playing – that’s more than just being a good kid.

Where is this league headed?

While the women have scrimmaged against their kids, there isn’t an overwhelming need to compete. No one wants to lose to mom, and the moms are having a good time learning about hockey, getting to know each other and getting some great exercise. They’re happy with the league at the level that they’re at now. There’s always room for more interested women to learn about the sport.

Perhaps the Chiller will one day have enough women playing for a daytime hockey league. If the level of enthusiasm from the players is any indication, that time will be sooner rather than later.