No need to yell 'Car!' - ball hockey's the real deal

Courtesy of Winnipeg Sun - Doug Lunney

I loved playing street hockey as a kid, but there were two annoyances that couldn’t be avoided.

If you missed the net on a hard shot it was long walk to get the ball, which was only worse if it went under a car or in a neighbour’s shrubbery. Then there were those motorists who frequently halted the action.

If only the Manitoba Minor Ball Hockey League was around when I was a kid.

The Manitoba Ball Hockey Association was formed in 1978 and adults have enjoyed the game ever since, but it was only in 2010 that youth leagues began. Joining a trend that has swept the nation, youth registrations in Winnipeg have doubled each season and show no sign of letting up.

The sport is cheap, anyone who can play street hockey can participate, it’s great exercise and games are never cancelled due to poor weather since they’re held in arenas that would otherwise be empty during the spring and early summer months.

Makes you wonder why we weren’t doing this decades ago in Winnipeg.

“It’s probably been the most underrated game in Canada for the past 20 years,” said Jeff Dzikowicz, the MBHA’s technical league director, who also plays. “(The growth) is really exciting because we’ve been involved in this for so long.”

There are 49 youth teams for players ages four to 16. In three seasons, youth registration has doubled each year with about 800 players this season.

“Youth registrations are exploding across Canada,” said MBHA’s executive league director, Kelly Huff. “We’re small potatoes compared to Ontario, B.C. and Quebec. We really started to take notice when we’d go to these national championships and we’d be saying ‘Look at all these 18- and 19-year-old kids playing. Where do they get these guys?’

“Then you find out they’d been developing them the last 10 years playing kids ball hockey. So we thought we have to get a youth program. Our biggest stumbling block was getting arenas.”

The MBHA was in panic mode a couple of weeks before the season started in April because it didn’t have enough venues, due to the sudden rise in youth registrations. Fearing about 200 players would have to be refunded their fees, the MBHA desperately requested the City of Winnipeg open another arena to go with Billy Mosienko. The City agreed to open Terry Sawchuk and the season was saved.

Huff and Dzikowicz expect to ask the City for more rinks next season, knowing registrations could double for a fourth year. Otherwise they could be turning kids away and that would be a shame.

“We get a lot of aboriginal and inner-city kids playing because of the cost of it, and we partner up with other organizations so that they can offset the cost. It’s just a win-win situation,” Huff said, adding many of the referees and timekeepers hired are students.

“Kids love it. They feel like they’re playing organized street hockey — and it’s inexpensive. You take that skating element out of it and it balances everything out. The kids that aren’t great skaters, but can handle a ball are just as good now as the kid who can fly down the ice. That’s the attraction to the sport — you don’t have to play ice hockey to play ball hockey.”

And nobody ever has to yell “Caaarrrrrr!”

FACTS AND FIGURES ABOUT BALL HOCKEY:

• The MBHA and MMBHL have more than 2,500 active members combined playing in various leagues throughout the year. The Canadian Ball Hockey Association has 52,000 participants, including more than 20,000 youth players.
• Games are played under CBHA rules. There’s no body contact.
• The only equipment required is a stick, helmet and cage, hockey gloves, runners and soccer shin guards.
• Youth registrations for the past three seasons increased in Winnipeg from 240 to 402 then 756 this year, including about 40 girls. The biggest rise has been in the under-11 (13 teams) and under-13 divisions (11 teams). Registrations are expected to rise and possibly double again next year.
• Individual youth registration fees range from $99 for under-7 players to $165 for the remainder. Youth season starts in late April and ends in late June with most games on week nights.
• MBHA uses five arenas — Varsity View, Billy Mosienko, Terry Sawchuk, Glenwood and St. Norbert.
• MBHA is sending four Winnipeg players to the under-18 World Ball Hockey Championship in June at the Czech Republic. They are Remi Laurencelle, Ryan Hutton, Kallan Kastes and Dylan Pascoe.
• Manitoba will have three teams (U19, U17 and U15) at the Canadian Championships in Vernon, B.C. in July.