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Photos by Mark Mulville/Buffalo News
The Icy Red North team is geared up to hit the ice
at the Amherst Pepsi Center.
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Vicky Topper has a 6-0-2 record playing goal for two Icy
Red teams.
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Performax Hockey lacks everything a hard-hitting hockey
buff would want. That's why you won't find many former college and high
school players skating in the Amherst Pepsi Center during the senior league
nights. Forget about skull-rattling cross-checks and team brawls, too. Simply
put, Performax isn't a typical senior hockey league, but that's exactly what
league director Ed Ellis loves about it.
Where else can
you find a 58-year-old man who learned to skate just three years ago going
from blue line to blue line, a 24-year-old female goalkeeper blocking men's
shots, and an Amherst police lieutenant, who is also a mother of three,
zipping passes to her patrol officers?
"I mean,
that summarizes what we are all about," Ellis said. "We're not like
those other leagues. We care most about teaching the novice players. . . . We
treat it more like a club than a league."
Performax's
summer membership has roughly 400-450 players of varying age, gender and
experience playing on 30 teams split into four divisions based on skill
level.
While there
are experienced athletes playing in Performax's upper divisions, it
originally started as an adult instructional program 21 years ago. Performax
program director Frank Albert was coaching youth hockey, and it wasn't until
a father/son game when he realized the need for an adult program.
"The fathers
were saying, "If only I could learn the sport the way my son can,' and
that's when it really dawned on me that there wasn't that opportunity for
adults to learn thegame," Albert said.
Soon,
Performax Hockey's adult instructional program gave way to a four-team league
of beginners, which has grown to where it is now, one of the largest of a
dozen senior leagues offered in the Buffalo area in the summer.
Albert still
oversees Western New York's longest-running adult hockey instructional
program, and every year, he says, a new group of beginners forms a senior
league team at the conclusion.
A few years
ago, 58-year-old Mike Gross and his Icy Red South teammates were the newest
members of the senior league. But there was definitely a learning curve for
Gross, who vividly remembers his first in-game experience.
"For my
first line change, I thought I could jump right over the boards (onto the
ice), and I fell backward into my own bench," said Gross, dubbed
"Grandpa" by teammates. "My teammates then promptly pushed me
over, and I landed right on the puck. That was my first introduction to
hockey. I think things have gotten better since then."
Gross worries
that he's a liability to his team because he isn't the quickest or most
graceful player on the ice. But as long as his teammates are supportive,
Gross doesn't see any reason to quit playing the sport he always wanted to
try.
"I'm
convinced I couldn't play in any other league besides Performax because
unless it's a beginner league it's all old guys who've played before,"
Gross said. "I can't take the ice with guys my age who've played 30 or
40 years and think that I'm their peer. I have to be on the ice with guys
that fit my skill level and tolerance level."
It helps that
Icy Red South and Icy Red North captain Ron Fitzpatrick, a middle-aged
accountant, agrees with Gross.
"I try to
keep most of the guys on who are beginners," Fitzpatrick said. "I
always say I'm not going to bounce anyone because of skill because I'd be the
second guy out the door."
One person who
won't have to worry about being shown the door is 24-year-old Vicky Topper,
the lone goalkeeper for both Icy Red teams. Topper is also the only female on
the Icy Red North team, but she's putting the gender issue to rest with her
6-0-2 record.
After
recording 22 saves and another shutout in Icy Red North's 10-0 victory
Thursday night over Amherst Blue, Topper leads the eight-team Sportsman North
division with six wins, three shutouts, a 1.25 goals-against average and .941
save percentage.
"Occasionally,
you get two guys busting on another saying, "You got beat by a girl,' so
that's kind of funny when that happens," Fitzpatrick said. "But
from a performance standpoint, I don't think there's much of a difference.
There's nights she'll come out and make some saves and it's just like,
"Where did that come from?' "
Topper has
been playing since she was 19 and served as a backup all three years she was
on the Niagara University women's hockey team. She got her first starting gig
with the Niagara County Coyotes, an independent women's team.
Though she
says she doesn't have a preference playing against men or women, Topper loves
the challenge of stopping the men's shots.
"Most of
the time I don't think about (whose shots I'm blocking)," Topper said.
"It's only when there are the men where you can tell they are thinking,
"Oh it's a girl, I should be able to score.' That's when it's fun to
stuff them."
"Each
team has between one and three women sprinkled on," said Holly Hubert of
Amherst Blue. "We are definitely the minorities out there, but when you
lace them up everything's the same."
No matter how
Amherst Blue's players lace them up, they can't shed the unique label of
being the team comprised almost entirely of Amherst police officers.
Four summers
ago, Amherst road lieutenant JoAnn DiNoto was looking for a way to lose her
pregnancy weight after giving birth to twins, Frankie and Julia, so she
joined Albert's instructional program. She later posted fliers at work asking
if anyone wanted to create a senior league team, and she had plenty of
takers.
"Performax
appealed to us because the Pepsi Center had late hours and Ed guaranteed we
could play every Thursday at 11 (p.m.) so it didn't conflict with the people
who worked the 3-11 shift," said DiNoto, who recently moved to a daytime
position and cannot fit Performax games into her schedule.
"What I
like is that you can play good, clean hockey without the risk of a cheap shot
injuring you," DiNoto said. "I mean, we all have to go to work the
next day."
While other
leagues have problems with fighting, Performax remains one of the cleanest
leagues in Buffalo, referees Angelo Ciccarelli and Chuck Mendola said.
Couple that
clean play with a welcoming environment that caters to all types of hockey
players, and that's what makes Performax his league of choice, said Craig
Maslona, 22, the leading scorer on both Icy Red teams.
"I'm not
going to play in the NHL, so why bother playing at a more competitive
level?" Maslona said. "I just love playing, and it's a jlot of fun
playing on Icy Red. . . . Some of the players who are 40 years old will be
the best players on the ice and the kid who's 20 is not that good. With our
team, we really don't care as long as we all get along."
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