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Miracle on ice takes on new meaning : Home: The Buffalo News
She’s a feisty hockey player who loves going to the net where all the traffic is. At age 12, she plays on two teams, a Tier I Amherst girls travel team and a boys-and-girls team of schoolmates from Sweet Home Middle School.
Yes, Katelyn Koester of Amherst plays hockey with the boys and doesn’t back down.
But this weekend, Katelyn is experiencing a first in her hockey career. She’s playing on a team with other deaf youngsters as part of this weekend’s USA Hockey Disabled Festival, which features 43 teams and 600 athletes with various disabilities in the Amherst Pepsi Center.
The fifth annual festival will include a full slate of free games that started Friday morning and runs through early Sunday afternoon. Teams will play in three categories: hearing impaired; special hockey, for people with mental disabilities; and sled hockey, for people with physical disabilities.
Katelyn is suiting up with the national deaf youth team for three weekend games in the Pepsi Center that started Friday night. The last two games, both against local hearing teams, are scheduled for 6:30 p. m. today and 10 a.m. Sunday.
It’s the first chance for Katelyn to engage in all the dialogue on her team’s bench and in the locker room. The first chance for her to play on a team where others can’t hear. And the first chance for a coach to speak to her in her language.
Katelyn — and anyone else venturing out to the Pepsi Center for any of the deaf team’s three games — will notice two major differences from other hockey games:
• Every time the whistle blows, four bright white strobe lights will go off, alerting the deaf players that the whistle has sounded.
• During the second period of those three games, players from both the hearing and deaf teams will have a full period of silence, with no coaches or players allowed to talk, on the ice or the bench.
Anyone violating that rule will be subject to a minute-and-a- half penalty — for talking.
“We want hockey players on a hearing team to experience what it’s like not to use their voice to communicate,” said Rick Fask, the Massachusetts representative to USA Hockey for disabled hockey. “They would get a sense of what it might be like to play a game in silence.”
That’s one of the key themes of the weekend festival — to raise other people’s consciousness about young athletes with disabilities.
“We want to let people know about these athletes,” said Norm Page of Lancaster, USA Hockey national sled manager. “Our dream is to reach out to the community to find other children [with disabilities] who want to play a sport. This is an opportunity to find those kids and let the community know what we’re doing.”
Buffalo has carved out a reputation as perhaps the sled hockey capital of the nation, as it put five local players on the 15-member national team. But the festival will shine a spotlight on the other types of disabled hockey.
Festival officials say the enthusiastic local response to the event coming here proves two things about Buffalo: It’s a hockey town and a caring town.
“I’m just blown away by this, the volunteers, the donations and the support of the people of Buffalo and Western New York,” said Page, who’s been a leader of Buffalo Sabres Sled Hockey. “It’s been amazing.”
While the festival is not intended as a money-making event, Page said there’s a good chance that it could make money, maybe even thousands of dollars, through donations.
“That’s exciting, because we’ll be able to build disabled hockey in Western New York and give more kids an opportunity to play,” he said. “It also raises the awareness.”
About players like Katelyn. She’s had to battle two challenges in her hockey career — as a girl, at a time when there still are more programs and teams for boys, and as a hearing- impaired player.
“There are more and more opportunities for girls now, but what makes it difficult for her is her disability,” said her father, Jim Koester, who attends all of Katelyn’s practices and games to help with the communication.
“You hear the whistle; she can’t hear the whistle,” her father said. “You hear the puck behind you; she can’t hear the puck. She doesn’t get any of the auditory clues the other kids get.”
Koester was asked to describe his daughter’s style of play, as a left wing.
“She’s a scrapper,” he said. “She’s the guy in front, the [Sabres’ Paul] Gaustad. She’s not the biggest girl in the world, but she’s not afraid to go to the front of the net.”
Deaf hockey is not a new phenomenon.
Former Chicago Blackhawks star Stan Mikita first ran a camp for hearing-impaired players in the early 1970s. That school has fed players to the U. S. “Deaflympic” Hockey Team, which has won medals at the last four Winter Deaflympics.
The sport is on the cusp of some technological breakthroughs that will make it more manageable for deaf players.
Fask — who prefers the terms “deaf” and “hard of hearing,” rather than “hearing impaired” — mentioned other advances besides the strobe lights, which are mounted on the top of the glass at each blue line.
The strobe lights work well, especially for a team with all deaf players. But it’s not always feasible for a team with one or two deaf players.
So deaf hockey is looking at two other innovations, wristbands or vibrating pagers, almost like restaurant beepers, that would alert a player to the whistle being blown.
“The idea of the wristband or the vibrating pager would be one that individual deaf skaters could use if they’re assimilated on a regular hearing team,” Fask said.
That’s where many deaf players are playing. Katelyn has great local coaches, who take the time to diagram on-ice drills and have players demonstrate them with a quick skate-through, her father said. But the communication remains a big challenge for her on hearing teams.
Koester mentioned one of his daughter’s key assets in succeeding as an athlete with a disability.
“Katelyn doesn’t know she’s deaf,” he said. “That speaks a lot to her character. She doesn’t know that she’s different.”
At midweek, while looking forward to the new opportunity for his daughter, Koester admitted that the whole experience might be a touching one for him; his wife, Linda; and their children.
“I think it’s going to be a little bit emotional,” he said. “It’s going to be nice to see Katelyn with other people who share the same disability she has.”
That’s just what the festival organizers had in mind.
She’s a feisty hockey player who loves going to the net where all the traffic is. At age 12, she plays on two teams, a Tier I Amherst girls travel team and a boys-and-girls team of schoolmates from Sweet Home Middle School.
Yes, Katelyn Koester of Amherst plays hockey with the boys and doesn’t back down.
But this weekend, Katelyn is experiencing a first in her hockey career. She’s playing on a team with other deaf youngsters as part of this weekend’s USA Hockey Disabled Festival, which features 43 teams and 600 athletes with various disabilities in the Amherst Pepsi Center.
The fifth annual festival will include a full slate of free games that started Friday morning and runs through early Sunday afternoon. Teams will play in three categories: hearing impaired; special hockey, for people with mental disabilities; and sled hockey, for people with physical disabilities.
Katelyn is suiting up with the national deaf youth team for three weekend games in the Pepsi Center that started Friday night. The last two games, both against local hearing teams, are scheduled for 6:30 p. m. today and 10 a.m. Sunday.
It’s the first chance for Katelyn to engage in all the dialogue on her team’s bench and in the locker room. The first chance for her to play on a team where others can’t hear. And the first chance for a coach to speak to her in her language.
Katelyn — and anyone else venturing out to the Pepsi Center for any of the deaf team’s three games — will notice two major differences from other hockey games:
• Every time the whistle blows, four bright white strobe lights will go off, alerting the deaf players that the whistle has sounded.
• During the second period of those three games, players from both the hearing and deaf teams will have a full period of silence, with no coaches or players allowed to talk, on the ice or the bench.
Anyone violating that rule will be subject to a minute-and-a- half penalty — for talking.
“We want hockey players on a hearing team to experience what it’s like not to use their voice to communicate,” said Rick Fask, the Massachusetts representative to USA Hockey for disabled hockey. “They would get a sense of what it might be like to play a game in silence.”
That’s one of the key themes of the weekend festival — to raise other people’s consciousness about young athletes with disabilities.
“We want to let people know about these athletes,” said Norm Page of Lancaster, USA Hockey national sled manager. “Our dream is to reach out to the community to find other children [with disabilities] who want to play a sport. This is an opportunity to find those kids and let the community know what we’re doing.”
Buffalo has carved out a reputation as perhaps the sled hockey capital of the nation, as it put five local players on the 15-member national team. But the festival will shine a spotlight on the other types of disabled hockey.
Festival officials say the enthusiastic local response to the event coming here proves two things about Buffalo: It’s a hockey town and a caring town.
“I’m just blown away by this, the volunteers, the donations and the support of the people of Buffalo and Western New York,” said Page, who’s been a leader of Buffalo Sabres Sled Hockey. “It’s been amazing.”
While the festival is not intended as a money-making event, Page said there’s a good chance that it could make money, maybe even thousands of dollars, through donations.
“That’s exciting, because we’ll be able to build disabled hockey in Western New York and give more kids an opportunity to play,” he said. “It also raises the awareness.”
About players like Katelyn. She’s had to battle two challenges in her hockey career — as a girl, at a time when there still are more programs and teams for boys, and as a hearing- impaired player.
“There are more and more opportunities for girls now, but what makes it difficult for her is her disability,” said her father, Jim Koester, who attends all of Katelyn’s practices and games to help with the communication.
“You hear the whistle; she can’t hear the whistle,” her father said. “You hear the puck behind you; she can’t hear the puck. She doesn’t get any of the auditory clues the other kids get.”
Koester was asked to describe his daughter’s style of play, as a left wing.
“She’s a scrapper,” he said. “She’s the guy in front, the [Sabres’ Paul] Gaustad. She’s not the biggest girl in the world, but she’s not afraid to go to the front of the net.”
Deaf hockey is not a new phenomenon.
Former Chicago Blackhawks star Stan Mikita first ran a camp for hearing-impaired players in the early 1970s. That school has fed players to the U. S. “Deaflympic” Hockey Team, which has won medals at the last four Winter Deaflympics.
The sport is on the cusp of some technological breakthroughs that will make it more manageable for deaf players.
Fask — who prefers the terms “deaf” and “hard of hearing,” rather than “hearing impaired” — mentioned other advances besides the strobe lights, which are mounted on the top of the glass at each blue line.
The strobe lights work well, especially for a team with all deaf players. But it’s not always feasible for a team with one or two deaf players.
So deaf hockey is looking at two other innovations, wristbands or vibrating pagers, almost like restaurant beepers, that would alert a player to the whistle being blown.
“The idea of the wristband or the vibrating pager would be one that individual deaf skaters could use if they’re assimilated on a regular hearing team,” Fask said.
That’s where many deaf players are playing. Katelyn has great local coaches, who take the time to diagram on-ice drills and have players demonstrate them with a quick skate-through, her father said. But the communication remains a big challenge for her on hearing teams.
Koester mentioned one of his daughter’s key assets in succeeding as an athlete with a disability.
“Katelyn doesn’t know she’s deaf,” he said. “That speaks a lot to her character. She doesn’t know that she’s different.”
At midweek, while looking forward to the new opportunity for his daughter, Koester admitted that the whole experience might be a touching one for him; his wife, Linda; and their children.
“I think it’s going to be a little bit emotional,” he said. “It’s going to be nice to see Katelyn with other people who share the same disability she has.”
That’s just what the festival organizers had in mind.