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| Burnaby Wildcats Novice at the NHL Heritage Classic |
Manager: Joanne Lee
If ever anyone needs convincing that hockey is the best sport in the world and that all young kids should at least be given the opportunity to participate in an organized hockey league, just bring them to observe the Burnaby Wildcats Novice team. This team of players ages 5 to 8 years old have been living it up and experiencing the joys of playing a team sport like hockey throughout the entire season!
February and March have been particularly exciting for the team. They started off the month of February by participating in the Grouse Mountain Pond Hockey Tournament. This annual tournament, held on the outdoor rink at Grouse Mountain, was a unique experience for all the players as they played some 3 on 3 hockey complete with no icings, offsides, or whistles of any kind, and they got to go up against other teams from the region, many of which were comprised only of boys. It was an incredible experience for everyone involved and will definitely go down as one of the highlights of the season.
The other highlight to end the hockey season was that the Wildcats Novice team was one of 8 teams out of so many in the Lower Mainland to participate in the used hockey gear renewal program, sponsored by TeamSnap and NHL Green.
TeamSnap is a web service that helps run sports teams online. Coaches, managers, players, and parents can sign on to this website to view everything from the team's upcoming schedule of practices and games, to upcoming events, to player availability for each game. The website also allows for tracking of team funds as well as the arranging of team snacks and special events. The Wildcats Novice team utilizes TeamSnap for many of these functions as it is an easy and time-efficient way of handling daily team activities and commitments. Other great features of TeamSnap include stats keeping and SMS messaging. While the Novice team did not utilize the stats tool this season, mainly because they do not keep track of scores just yet, they expect that this tool will become very handy for the team in the next few years as they start moving towards keeping an accurate log of all the various stats in hockey.
NHL Green is an initiative of the National Hockey League, which promotes green living in all communities. NHL Green aims to provide education to the public on actions that can help us keep our environment clean and healthy. The program promotes and encourages sustainable living practices such as the recycling of paper products, electronics, and hockey gear, the planting of trees, water restoration projects, and even fuel-cell technologies used to light NHL arenas.
As the end of the hockey season approaches, one thing is always in abundance in the home of a hockey player: used hockey gear. To that end, the Wildcats participated in the above-mentioned used hockey gear renewal program as a way of giving back to the hockey community and contributing to healthy environmental practices. The team was rewarded for their kindness by being given tickets to the 2014 NHL Heritage Classic in Vancouver! Before puck-drop between the Vancouver Canucks and the Ottawa Senators on March 1st, the parking lot of the Plaza of Nations was transformed into Spectator Plaza - a place where players could drop off old hockey gear and teams could activate their TeamSnap memberships. Craig Johnson of TeamSnap was on hand to greet the girls and, once the girls had donated all their used hockey gear, give them their prized tickets! The gear will be donated to HEROES Hockey in Vancouver - a charitable organization that empowers youth through ice hockey. The Wildcats Novice team was thrilled to participate in this worthy cause.
The players and their parents had an amazing time at the game and they are now looking forward to one final practice to end the season. The coaches are planning a light-hearted and fun practice on this final day.
The Burnaby Wildcats Novice team would like to thank TeamSnap and NHL Green for the generous gift of tickets to the Heritage Classic Game and for the opportunity to donate their gear to such a worthy charity. Through this process, the team not only got to enjoy a unique outdoor NHL game, but they also learned about giving back to the game and to the community which has given them so much!
~ Jehan Jiwa
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