Hockey is more than just a game; it's an arena where friendships blossom, brotherhood flourishes, and experiences are shared. The West Ottawa Hockey Team embodies this in its every move, showcasing the intricacies of relationships among teammates, coaches, and family. This episode delves into the strong bonds formed on and off the ice, narrated through vibrant stories of Tyler Noblett, Krue Anderson and Coach Tom Carey as they navigate through highs and lows in their hockey journey.
As conversations flow, this group of young athletes discusses the impact of family in their journey and the chemistry amongst teammates. Coach Tom Carey passionately describes his dual role of being a mentor while nurturing his brotherly bonds with other team members. He shares experiences mingled with playful anecdotes, illuminating how these relationships foster a supportive atmosphere.
We spend time delving into the player's love of hockey from an early age, and the fascinating origin stories of how hockey became a part of their lives.
Having 5 sets of brothers on the team creates a unique dynamic, providing these siblings with an uncommon experience in sports.
Transitioning into lighter topics, Tyler and Krue reminisce about the quirks, humor, and traditions that make the hockey experience so fulfilling. Pregame rituals, food preferences, and those unforgettable game-day suits roll into the discussion, creating an engaging landscape where the atmosphere is filled with laughter and camaraderie. The episode leaves riveting impressions about connections forged in the locker rooms and on the ice.
This insightful episode truly elaborates on not just the victories, but on the shared laughter, struggles, and the steadfast unity of a team determined to support each other through thick and thin. The West Ottawa Hockey team is a living testament of how family, friends, and shared passion contribute significantly in shaping not just players, but remarkable individuals.
Teagan Johnson, Ethan Moore, Carson Arens, Charlie Moungkhoun, Tyler Noblett, Krey Anderson, Conor Reidy, Aidan Reidy, Kyler Comment, Ethan Noblett, Jake Griffith, Nate Bean, Krue Anderson, Jason Hoort, Eli Bean, Connor Haley, Harrison Butcher, Will Nagelvoort, Tom Carey, Dan Carey, Darin Mihelac.
This episode was recorded on February 6, 2025.
Podcasts now dropping at 5pm every Sunday evening for that late weekend chill, or listen Monday AM during that morning commute or workout. Please like, follow, subscribe, or leave a review. Even share with someone who might like to listen. Thanks for taking the time to get to know each other a little bit better. The people who make West Ottawa Athletics what it is. Go WO!
Special thanks to Laura Veldhof Photography.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
everyone's in a super good mental space this year.
I feel like everyone's got agood friend to sit with at lunch
, everyone's got someone to talkto and I feel like outside of
the rink that's super, superimportant.
But going into more me andEthan's relationship, I feel
like especially the car rideshome even after like a bad game
or even a good game.
I remember the first game hescored on the road.
I remember sitting in the truckand just going crazy or playing
(00:22):
some music I.
But I remember sitting in thetruck and just going crazy or
playing some music.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I told dad we were going to go get ice cream.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
It was super awesome to just have him in the car and
just know like, hey, we'reliving in the same household,
we're sleeping under the sameroof.
That's someone to be proud of.
Speaker 4 (00:37):
Hey everybody, this is Rodney Valinga with the West
Ottawa High School AthleticProgram and you're listening to
the 29.1 Podcast 29 sports, oneteam, the show that brings you
into the lives of studentathletes, coaches and other
faces in the Panther sportscommunity, Bringing you the
stories you might otherwisenever hear.
(00:59):
Join myself and AthleticDirector Bill Kennedy as we dive
in with you to get to know eachother a little bit better.
Speaker 5 (01:12):
Five sets of brothers all on one team, From the head
coaches all the way down to theentire roster, Panther Hockey is
a brotherhood.
Speaker 6 (01:20):
Today we are joined by Panther Hockey coach Tom
Carey, senior Tyler Noblet andjunior Crew Anderson Fresh off a
first-round win in the OKConference Tournament.
The boys join us to talk aboutthe season thus far and look
ahead to a big rivalry gameagainst Grand Haven.
Speaker 5 (01:35):
Whether it's Jimmy Johns and a bag of chips, or
spending time in the labperfecting their shots, these
guys do it together Coach TomCarey, senior Tyler Noblet and
Junior Crew Anderson.
Speaker 6 (01:46):
Up next on the 29.1 Podcast.
Speaker 5 (01:48):
Let's get it you've been to a west auto varsity home
(02:15):
game.
That's the sound that'sfamiliar to you senior assistant
captain charlie mon coonripping out the star spangled
banner on electric guitar on theice, on skates.
He's got his amp near the homebench.
It's a great way to get a gamestarted and, uh, even better way
to start off this podcast.
Uh well, welcome, uh, toanother episode of the 29 one
(02:35):
podcast.
I'm your host, rodney valenga.
I'm just a west ottawa parent,like many of you listening, and
I'm here with former francisscott key high school outside
linebacker William Lee KennedyIV correct, that's right.
Also known as Athletic DirectorBill Kennedy.
It's no doubt winter, and ithas been for a while.
Today we have three members ofthe West Ottawa Varsity Hockey
(02:58):
Team with us.
They are coming off a reallybig OK Red Conference tournament
win last night and are graciousenough to join us today.
And it's our pleasure to askwho is it?
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Tyler Noblet.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Curry, anderson, tom Carey.
Speaker 6 (03:14):
Awesome, Super pumped to have you guys here today.
Check the score as soon as Iget up this morning to make sure
that we were all going to be ina good mood as we got together
as we had this scheduled Big winto get us into the semifinal
the conference tournament, andwe have a little bit of a rival
waiting for us on Friday night,so super fired up for that.
Speaker 5 (03:37):
Yeah, we're excited for that and we're also excited
to kind of be here.
We are taking the 29-1 podcaston the road.
You guys are are.
Where are we fellas at the?
Speaker 3 (03:47):
at the rink at griff's yeah and uh, the hope
film room it looks like yes uh,griff's ice house west, this
north side of holland, just offat 31.
Speaker 5 (03:57):
Have you guys been in this room before?
Speaker 1 (03:59):
uh yeah, we've done a lot of film up here before,
especially growing up playingfor the ice dogs.
Sometimes we'll get the roomand be able to do film upstairs
and it's a sweet place to be Ilove.
We've done a lot of film uphere before especially growing
up playing for the Ice Dogs.
Sometimes we'll get the room andbe able to do film upstairs and
it's a sweet place to be.
I love being up here.
You were doing film as an IceDog.
How old were you when you weredoing that?
I mean ages from like 9 to 15.
Whenever we get the chance tocome up here, we'd come up and
(04:20):
try and do film up on the TVthey have up here.
Speaker 6 (04:25):
No kidding, this is the first episode of the 29-1
not recorded at West Ottawa HighSchool.
So you guys are pioneers in thepodcast space on the road.
Speaker 5 (04:32):
Coach, this is pretty much your guys' second home
during this.
What, from November forward, atleast with this team, right oh?
Speaker 2 (04:38):
for sure.
Yeah, I mean, I pretty muchlive here.
It seems like and same withthese guys.
Speaker 5 (04:46):
Crew.
What's the craziest time you'vebeen at this arena?
Either day or night, it's.
What time is it right now wegot what little after 3 3 in the
afternoon.
What are some of the craziesttimes a day you've been in this
building?
Speaker 3 (04:56):
we did a lock-in for ice dogs like my travel team, I
think, a couple years back, andwe were here all night oh, let's
go.
I think we got on the ice atlike 2 am for a little skate and
uh, yeah, that was pretty fun.
We've been here crazy times,though.
Speaker 5 (05:12):
For sure, yeah, ice is cheaper at 2 am oh, yeah,
probably let's talk about, uh,last night's win, um, last
night's wins got you to what?
8, 11-11-1.
I went on max preps.
Hopefully that's accurate.
That was a really big win lastnight, hard-fought win against
Forest Hills Eastern Northern.
Scoreless first period to startcrew.
(05:33):
What was the pace of that gameearly on?
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yeah, I mean there was a bunch of chances here and
there, but good goalie for them.
And then we also had Willie AnnNett, so that kept us in it.
But yeah, I mean we werelooking to get one and then
started the second.
We got one pretty early on thepower play and then finished
with another.
Speaker 5 (05:51):
So yeah, pretty good.
I want to personally thank theAnderson brothers for doing the
goals that we're going to talkabout the brotherhood of this
team a little bit later.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
So you guys scoring too, tell me about those second
period goals they were superawesome to be a part of being
crew score his like our secondgoal of the game that it shot
seriously iced in my veins and Iwas super excited to see him
score and throw his hands up.
So it was a really good feeling, especially getting up to well
in the second period so that wassuper awesome for us.
Speaker 5 (06:22):
Coach you get to that third period will's playing
really nice and that he wasstanding on his head a little
bit last night.
Uh, they score what four orfive minutes into the third
period.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
Then you guys really got to go to work yeah, we, we
talked about going in, uh, goinginto the third period in the
room that we're trying to keepit from being a game all over
again where you're up to nothingand coming back out there and
kind of get a little loose inthat first couple shifts and try
and just keep the pace our wayand of course three, four
minutes in we give up one andour heels are kind of pressed
(06:54):
and they gave it to us for acouple minutes there and we
ended up calling a timeout lateand I think it was like five,
six minutes left in the thirdand readjusted some of our four
check in our neutral zone andkind of went to a 1-3-1 and was
able to hold them off and thenmade it interesting for the last
30 seconds or so with thetripping down there with
(07:16):
somebody sitting here, yeah.
Speaker 5 (07:17):
I saw hey man, I was behind the net watching.
I'm like where was that penalty?
Was it a trip?
Yeah.
I definitely got him.
That was bad.
Well, you had to with 12seconds left.
I mean you can't let them get ascoring chance that late in the
game.
Speaker 6 (07:33):
Yeah, and then we're going to turn around after the
conference tournament and we'regoing to see these guys again
next week prior to heading intoregionals.
What is that like?
Kind of circling back andgetting to see that team again?
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Yeah, I mean we know what to expect from like a four
check or a neutral zone kind ofstandpoint, but I mean anything
can really happen.
I know they were down theirstarting goalie, I think.
So you know they could come outstronger.
Speaker 5 (07:55):
But yeah, I mean we'll see that was a really they
have some really big players,some of those forwards.
I mean, can we?
Just give a kudos to TeganJohnson for a minute.
Pound for pound.
This kid is tough, tyler, maybeyou can talk about him a little
bit.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
I've been playing hockey with Tegan seriously,
like nine years in a row.
We've been on the same teamgrowing up all throughout,
playing Highland Ice Dogs andplaying West Ottawa.
It's been a crazy experience,had the ups and downs, but he's
always, pound for pound, had themost amount of effort I've ever
seen out of a hockey player.
Coach, what do you think abouthim?
Speaker 2 (08:33):
Yeah, he's been great .
I mean, he's really filled amuch bigger role this year.
He was probably right aroundour 50 last year and now he's
moving his way into the topthree.
He's getting a lot of minutesand, yeah, he's playing great
he's.
He's a lot tougher in thecorners and moving pucks up the
ice and, yeah, I've nevercoached a kid that gets hit as
much as he does, but he getsback up and gets out to the next
(08:55):
shift.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
So yeah, he took a big hit in that third period
over on those far boards and hewas down for I don't know 30, 40
seconds or so.
It's crazy how long it takesbecause a trainer is going out
on their running shoes orwhatever.
I mean, if you're going down inhockey, you're down for a
little bit, right, tyler?
I mean no one's getting therequick, I mean it always sucks
going down.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
It's a little embarrassing, but I mean, if you
can't stand up, you've got tostay down.
Make sure you're doing okay andjust play it safe at that point
you know, and you got hit inthat third period.
Speaker 5 (09:25):
I think you hit legs with somebody right.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
Yeah Over by the circle.
Yeah, he hit me clean, but Imean, I just had a little
knee-on-knee contact and then Ihad knee issues before that.
So I mean, just re-injuringwhat already happened, I went in
the locker room, I threw abrace on that I thought I didn't
need put a bunch of tape on itand said you know, I'm going to
suck it up and try and play therest of this game.
And that's hockey, ladies andgentlemen.
Speaker 6 (09:47):
Especially you get to this point of the high school
season.
You know we're a couple ofweeks away from postseason
starting.
There's virtually nobody in thelocker room.
Coach that's walking around100% at this point of the year,
right.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
No, we've been battling injuries all year,
which is tough.
We lost Carson at the Jenisongame so we're missing him for
the last five games.
Now Tyler took a knee-on-kneeagainst Caledonia so we lost him
for that game and then took aweek off.
It was kind of scary yesterdayseeing him take another knee and
then trying to figure out if hecan go or not.
(10:20):
But that's just the heart thatTyler has playing on basically
one leg all day yesterday, notall day, but that's just the
heart that Tyler has playing onbasically one leg all day
yesterday and not all day, butin the third.
So it's great to see these guys.
They want to get out there andget whatever they got banging up
, injuries or whatever it is.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Yeah, I noticed you went to the locker room right to
check on him.
Yeah, for sure I saw you leavethe bench.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
I gave Darren the reins for the five minutes and
went in and checked on Tyler tosee what he wanted to do and I
said, hey, it's up to you, it'syour call.
Like, if you want to go, I'llput you out there, if you don't,
then you can just hang out onthe bench.
And he's like no, I'm going, socrew you're uh, he's in the
locker room.
Speaker 5 (10:53):
You're trying to hold the fort for your team.
What's it like seeing him comeon and back to the bench and
jumping over the boards there?
Speaker 3 (10:58):
yeah, it's definitely a spark we needed.
You know, he's a prettyelectric forward, to say the
least, so that definitely helped, especially with, like him,
being a good buddy of mine.
Don't want to ever see him hurt.
Speaker 5 (11:08):
So right, yeah, it was good, let's get to you guys
a little bit.
Coach your second year here atwest ottawa, 30 years old, so
nice young coach.
It must be nice for a player tohave a younger coach.
Uh, talk about who yourassistants are and how.
That's kind of cool yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
So so we have Darren, who is a West auto grad.
He coached prior to me comingin.
So I gave, he called me and hewas like, hey, I really want to
keep going.
And I was like, all right,that's fine, like we'll do a
summer trial.
And I think I had him on thebench for one day and and talk
to him right afterwards and said, yeah, we're good.
Speaker 5 (11:42):
You knew right away, I knew right away, that's nice.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Just a couple of things that he was saying on the
bench.
He was engaged, the kids allliked him.
He knows what he's talkingabout, so that goes a long way.
Then my brother is our other.
He's our D coach.
That's your little brother,right?
Yeah, middle brother.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Did we say younger or ?
Speaker 5 (12:04):
little.
I was always called the littlebrother by my bigger brother and
I always took offense to that.
So you guys are pretty niceguys.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Yeah, I say younger, I mean Dan's not much, he's not
little anymore.
He probably can take me now, sohe's definitely a little bit
bigger than I am.
These guys like to give himgrief.
Speaker 5 (12:18):
You played a lot of hockey yourself growing up right
.
You played over on the eastside of the state.
Can you tell us a little bitabout your playing career?
Speaker 2 (12:24):
yeah, so I'm.
I'm from livonia.
So on the east side, um startedgotten skates at three and
played for livonia growing upand then played at victory honda
and then played four years atlivonia churchill and then went
over and played one year incanada and then, uh, went right
to the acha after that, afterrealizing that, yeah, I was just
(12:45):
to play in a subway D3 andcouldn't really afford it.
So, yeah, I went to the ACHAand nothing better.
Speaker 6 (12:51):
Yeah, my nephew actually got to play juniors in
Canada for a couple of years,lived with a couple of families
and then played out in LongBeach, california, for a while,
got traded to a team in Chicago.
He's actually playing for ateam out of Alpena right now.
Interestingly enough, though,like growing up, he was a goalie
from Alabama Huntsville, sowhere UAH really kind of started
(13:15):
their hockey program.
Junior hockey is just a crazyworld, right, and you guys have
aspirations, junior hockey.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
I mean like moving forward.
I would love to haveaspirations.
Junior hockey I mean likemoving forward, I would love to
go play junior hockey.
Obviously college is in thefuture, but if I could get like
a little taste of some tier two,tier three juniors, I would
love to be able to do that yeah,yeah and I think to.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
To play at the college level?
I want to.
I think juniors is a step Ineed to take and it's been.
It's been good.
I know ty Tyler and I have bothbeen able to practice with the
junior team out of this rink,the Fresh Coast Freeze, so
that's been pretty good just toget a feel for it, but yeah yeah
, I saw them at the jenison game.
Speaker 5 (13:55):
They were out in the crowd.
I didn't know who was there.
So just because I know hockey alittle bit, I know when people
show up in suits there'ssomebody yeah you know what I
mean.
So the fresh coast.
Uh, what, I'm not saying itwrong, what's it called?
Again, fresh coast freeze, itis okay, so it's fresh, because
they were there in suits.
I'm like, okay, I've gotsomebody here today, so how do
you guys feel about having?
Uh, what do you guys?
What do you guys like aboutyour coach?
I like about your coach andlike about your coaching staff I
(14:16):
love tom.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Tom's always got a different kind of energy than
stone did, because I played mysophomore year we had a
different coach and tom justbrought a different, more
level-headed kind of energy tothe game and kind of showed me
like, hey, hockey can be reallysimple, hockey can be really fun
if all you got to do is trustme.
And tom definitely brings thataspect of hey, I'm a guy, just
(14:38):
do what I say and we'll moveforward.
Drew.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Yeah, I think one good thing is just the age we
already kind of talked about.
They're all good friends withthem, but also we're here to
play hockey and they're all goodcoaches.
They know what they're talkingabout.
And then also when we're in theoffseason, I'll text Tom almost
every day with questions,whether that's like shooting
form or just like teams andstuff like that, and he's always
there to answer and kind ofhelp me out with that.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
So well, speaking of shooting, I was able to talk to
your pops on the phone the otherday and he's.
I said hey, tell me a littleabout crew.
I don't really know him at all.
You have a setup in your garagethat is quite extraordinary.
I heard right.
Can you give me the breakdown?
The breakdown, uh, your dadsaid you practice at least 200
shots a day, at least seven daysa week, sometimes eight days a
week, apparently.
Uh, what's it like in thatgarage, yours?
Speaker 3 (15:24):
yeah, I call it the lab.
You know I'll work on whateverI want, but I got a couple pads
and pull them out in thedriveway and then I got a tarp
in the garage and a couple netsand about 200 pucks and call it
good.
So yeah, and then my dad alsoset up like a speaker system.
So I got that going for me tooand it's been fun.
And then I've also been able tohave a couple friends come over
(15:45):
and teammates too, so get themgoing on shots.
But yeah, I think that'sdefinitely been a a good thing
for my shot, especially Tyleryou uh, uh, taken, been over
there check that out.
Speaker 5 (15:56):
Oh yeah, I've been invited.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
I've.
I remember the first time crewhad me over to shoot, he was
like alright, do you guys wantto just mess around or do
shooting drills?
I was like shooting drills, Iwas a little intimidated at
first and we ended up gettingthrough it.
But I just remember 1% betterevery day and that's a prime
example of that.
Speaker 6 (16:14):
We need a sign in there that says the Lab that is
legit.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
What's really funny, too, is when you love a sport
like that's not work to you.
Is it like you're as pureenjoyment?
Speaker 3 (16:25):
right.
Yeah, it's something I do in myfree time.
I mean, obviously, like if Ihad a bad game or miss a certain
shot, I'll work on that, butother time it's just.
It's just the want to getbetter or just to have fun.
Speaker 5 (16:36):
Really, your dad also had.
Like, everybody has an originstory when they start a sport,
right, like, how did you begin?
So can you tell me if you stillremember this?
He said you probably will thedouble stroller moment at a
community arena.
Do you remember that?
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Yeah, so it was my older sister.
It was back in Detroit where wegrew up and it was like a dance
studio or something like that,connected to a hockey rink, and
I think my older sister wasthere, and then I ended up like
wandering off and I think Iended up in the rink.
My mom caught me there and Ijust told her that I wanted to
skate, and then I think I waslike three or two at that time
(17:14):
and then I just kind of grewfrom there, I guess, yeah, yeah
at that time and then, and thenI just kind of grew from there.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
I guess yeah, yeah, it's pretty classic.
I just have all these likeinteresting stories how somebody
gets started.
Um coach, big move for him thisyear moving from playing
forward back to defense.
Can we, can you talk about hima little bit being able to do
that for the team and what itmeans?
Speaker 2 (17:35):
yeah, um, I think it was a tough sell at first.
I think we started at mona.
We were struggling and we werehaving issues trying to get
pucks out of our zone and crewwasn't really getting the puck a
whole lot up at the wing.
So going into like that, didyou going into the third, we
kind of just said, no, I'm just,we're just gonna try it out.
I mean, crew can handle thepuck, he's a good skater, he's a
(17:56):
big body, like yeah, we'll justtoss him back there and see how
he does.
And it was crazy.
He went from maybe touching thepuck like for 10, 15 seconds to
shift to now the puck's on hisstick for 20, 30 seconds and he
does a really good job of buyinghimself time and coming back
and finding the small areasbeing able to get pucks out of
our zone, able to get pucks outof our zone.
(18:18):
So it's, it's crazy how what ofa difference it's made and and
it was a tough sell for him atfirst.
But and we, uh, we we joked.
I joked with them at theChelsea showcase that I was like
crew, you've had two goals as aforward in nine games and now
you got six or seven as adefenseman in nine games.
So I think we're doing theright things here yeah, that was
a tough sell for you.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
Yeah, for sure, because sure.
Because I mean at home I'm justtraining to be a forward, just
like shot and the drills I do.
And then also like in the fallseason, like I played MDHL,
which is that league, and I wasa forward the whole time.
I was pretty successful there.
So I didn't know, like, what myfuture would look like as a D.
To say so, it was definitely alittle bit rough, especially,
definitely a little bit rough,especially because the season
(18:56):
didn't start out how Inecessarily wanted to and I was
just kind of still mad aboutthat.
But now I got no problem withit.
I get the puck and then, if Ireally wanted to, I could just
skate it up or just make it good, you don't win last night's
game if you're not playingdefense.
Speaker 5 (19:09):
Yeah, I'm serious, it's not even close, yeah.
Speaker 6 (19:19):
I mean, the team definitely helped there.
Uh, yeah, it's, it's something.
Hey, everybody has a role toplay.
Yeah, and tyler, what's thatlike for you to see one of your
buddies, one of your teammates,kind of be selfless, right, and
really thinking about the teamfirst and making a move like
that?
Speaker 1 (19:27):
I mean it's super awesome to see that we have guys
on the bench that are willingto do stuff and put the team
first.
Crew especially.
Especially moving back to d, Imean I've played my fair share
of d when I was a little kid,but it's nothing like what he's
doing now, being able to havethe skills that he has on the
back end, especially as aforward, being able to get out
of the zone.
You have confidence, knowingthe puck's going to go where he
(19:49):
wants it to go coach you want tospeak to that.
Speaker 5 (19:52):
There was some late third period last night.
There was a lot of pressuredeep in our zone, right.
Anyway, it was intense and thisguy here is getting the puck
out a lot.
I mean it was, it was tough buthe was getting it done.
What's it like having him backthere yeah, I mean it's, it's
great.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
I mean it was probably the one of the better
things we've done this year isputting him back there.
Uh, I mean he probably we playthe game 51 minutes and crew Kru
probably logs like 40.
Speaker 5 (20:19):
That was my next question.
It's awesome.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Like I said, early in the year, we struggled really
bad of getting pucks out of thezone.
Since we put Kru back there, hehas the capability of finding
that time and finding the guysout.
When we're stretching wings.
He's able to put the puck ontheir stick.
Like you said, he can get thepuck out when needed.
It's been awesome to see him doit.
Speaker 5 (20:40):
Just watching it, I think it's even as a.
If I'm on the other team as aforward going in, I'm like, oh,
this guy, I know this guy hasoffensive skills.
So it changes even you as aforward going into forecheck,
because you'll just do a sharpturn and head the other
direction like nothing, right.
Not every defenseman does that.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Right.
It just shows that he has thepuck skills and the skating
skills right, so it goes a longway with us.
Speaker 6 (21:03):
It's all about time in the lab, yeah.
Speaker 5 (21:07):
Without the lab, where would we?
Be, Tyler, I have someapologies to make for you.
I announced lacrosse over thelast few years and I've always
said noblet, so my apologies.
It's Tyler Noblet, so myapologies.
It's Tyler Noblet everybody,but you're also a lacrosse
player.
One thing I noticed about youlast night other than you're
great, you know, coming backfrom injury, your unique
(21:27):
face-off style is reallysomething to behold.
I mean, I maybe I'm wrong onthis, but you hold that stick
like 90 degrees.
It's almost like straight down.
Where'd you learn that?
Speaker 1 (21:38):
I'm gonna be 100% honest.
I learned like my sophomoreyear.
My dad pulled up a video ofdylan larkin taking face offs
and just trying to be aggressiveget as low as possible, put
your head in the center of thedot and I was like, hey, maybe
I'll try it.
And it ended up working out forme.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
So coach, that's not common to take draws like that.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
I haven't seen before of you or even around hockey
more than me, but I mean you cantake them as long as you're
winning.
I'm like whatever works for you, works for you, but yeah,
there's certain ways you cantake them, but as long as we're
winning the face-offs like, I'mnot gonna.
If it's not broke, don't fix it.
Speaker 5 (22:05):
So yeah, yep, you have a unique uh story too, for
starting uh, when you were alittle fellow, you guys used to
live out in muskegon.
Talk about you know kind of howyou became familiar with hockey
as a little kid.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Oh, I remember my parents have always been super
close around hockey.
They both went to MichiganState and Michigan State was
pretty dominant in hockey atthat time.
So always when I would be justI mean I was like two, three,
four years old there'd always behockey on the TV.
And I remember just wanting tosee, get mini sticks or go to a
game or at least put skates on.
(22:39):
And I remember my first actualexperience with hockey is we
have a little cottage up inMuskegon, yeah, and we went over
there and it's on the lake.
It's super like in the woodslake, like not very good ice.
And I remember going over therewith a shovel and I told my
dad's like hey, dad, I needskates, I need to try this.
And I mean I couldn't getskates, I need to try this.
(22:59):
And I mean I couldn't getskates right then and there and
then I kept pushing him andpushing him.
But eventually, like a year,year and a half later, he got me
skates and straight to learn toskate and instantly fell in
love.
Speaker 5 (23:10):
Yeah, once you get familiar with getting on the ice
and hitting the ice I know Igrew up with a lot of hockey
players and it's just like whenyou get on the ice it's just the
best feeling, isn't it, coach?
I mean, is it kind of a thingfor you?
Speaker 2 (23:21):
growing up too.
Oh yeah, I mean.
I love being at the rink likeit was.
If you're having a good day,bad day, like you get an hour,
two hours at the rink andnothing else really matters.
You get to hang out with yourbuddies, or just being on the
ice is awesome, and that's why Ienjoy coaching so much.
It's great being able to comehere if you have a bad day at
work, or even a good day.
Just being here with the boysis a lot of fun.
(23:42):
Look forward to it every day.
Speaker 5 (23:44):
There was an alumni game a little while ago.
What maybe a month or so ago?
Yeah, about.
Her coach laced up and wasplaying.
He can still hold his own, youguys?
What's he like?
Speaker 1 (23:54):
Oh my goodness, yeah, he can definitely hold his own
against us.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
Yeah, I don't know.
I talked to my mom after andshe kept wondering who was on
the ice, because I think he hadthe Max Schwartz jersey on from
last year and she just kepttalking to me wondering who it
was and I told her it was Tom,and yeah, I mean he's fine.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yeah, I've definitely lost a touch or two and just
getting older and a little bitwider.
Yeah, I mean, we all get that,but at age 30, you still got
most of it Trying to keep upwith these guys.
Speaker 6 (24:25):
So we have a real family affair going on with
hockey right now.
Tyler probably nobody more thanyou, right, because your mom
and dad are also helping to runthe hockey program right now you
know the administrative stuff,making sure chuck a puck gets
taken care of.
What's that experience beenlike?
To kind of bring them along andhave them be a part of your
(24:48):
senior year.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
Oh my goodness, it's such like it's just a part of
our family.
It's something that we can allrelate to and all tie together
on.
It's so cool, especially havingmy younger brother, ethan, on
the team.
It's super cool to see himprogress and accelerate and
learn to love the game and makenew friends.
And then having mason uh, alsoplaying ice dogs be in the
(25:09):
stands and just be supportiveand seeing my mom wear my jersey
.
It's just.
It's such that it ties ourfamily together so well and I
absolutely love it yeah, it wasa real long road to get here.
Speaker 5 (25:20):
You guys mentioned the Ice Dogs a few times.
Did you guys play together alot growing up?
I mean, you're what?
A year apart, so what's thatlike for you guys?
Speaker 1 (25:28):
We played together a couple years maybe two years but
we're both born in 2007.
So we ended up being on thesame Ice Dogs team most of the
time, or at least in the sameage group.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
How many games a year with Ice Dogs?
Speaker 3 (25:42):
I think it was around 50, I think for most seasons,
and then playoffs wouldsometimes lead it to more, but I
think around 50.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Around 50, and then you'd have some tournament
weekends that would go a littlefurther than 50.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
This must feel like a light schedule to you guys.
Speaker 3 (25:58):
Yeah, but the games are a lot more intense.
Speaker 5 (26:01):
Yeah, a little.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Just what you get from it.
Just taking all the hits andplaying as much, it definitely
takes a bigger toll on your body, for sure, yeah the high school
game tends to be prettyphysical.
Speaker 6 (26:13):
Yeah, right, and that's why we don't see a ton of
freshmen really play highschool hockey.
We have one on our roster, isthat right, coach?
Oh, three, we're young.
What is it like, kind ofintroducing those younger
players into the world of highschool hockey, where kids are a
little bit bigger and they'regoing to be a little bit more
aggressive?
Speaker 2 (26:33):
Yeah, yeah, it's, um, I think we're probably probably
one of the youngest high schoolteams, honestly, I mean.
But that's that's kind of whatwe, what we have right now, just
with.
I think we had what maybe 18,19 guys try out for our team
this year and we've we'vestarted with 17 and then connor
got hurt, then we're at 16, sonow we're back to 17.
(26:54):
So, yeah, I mean to be able totry and compete like the younger
guys.
You got to get them in earlyand get their feet wet.
They've all been great for us.
They've been, honestly, almostin every other shift Between
Aiden and Eli and Connor.
They play a ton.
It's good to see the young guysgetting in there and actually
contributing to the team.
Speaker 6 (27:16):
You guys spent a lot of time with Frank through the
offseason up in the weight room.
What is that, tyler?
Maybe you can speak to thisfirst.
What has that done for you?
As the season has gone on, haveyou seen the benefits of all of
that strength training in theoffseason?
Speaker 1 (27:31):
yeah, I mean definitely the boys have gotten
a little bit stronger.
Um, I feel like, adding on tothat, it's brought us together
to be more of a family and unitebecause we're all up, like when
we would do our lifts it'd bereally early, like 637 in the
morning, and nobody wants to getup at 630 in the morning,
especially in the summer and tosee everyone turn out and want
(27:51):
to be a part of this family.
It really brought everyoneclose together because we're
going through the hard timestogether and that's super
special to see.
Speaker 6 (27:59):
Yeah, that's the Dawn Patrol right there.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Yeah, and I think for me it's been yeah, a lot of the
team stuff with Frank.
Like we were just in theretoday and we hit a light lift
and then Frank was in thewrestling room with us and we
did like 20 minutes ofstretching and meditation.
So I mean he's been greatbecause he knows everything to
do.
But also, like I think when Iwas playing in MDHL, one thing I
kind of noticed was my speedwasn't where it was, wasn't
(28:23):
where it needed to be, I'll sayjust playing with all those
Detroit guys.
And then I texted Frank andsaid I was just looking to get
faster and he legit sent me likea 10-step routine of
plyometrics and I did them forthe entire fall after that and
then I've definitely seenprogress in my speed since then.
So I mean he's great.
Speaker 6 (28:44):
Coach.
That's Darren's role, right,Like he tends to be the coach in
the weight room with the guys.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
Yeah, him and I both were going in the summer near
the end of summer when the ruleskind of kick in and stuff like
that.
Yeah, darren pretty much tookover from there.
But yeah, we just did early inthe morning.
So I think we started at 6 30and that way.
That way these guys can havethe rest of the day and that way
I don't get in trouble at work.
I can actually get to theoffice at a decent hour.
Speaker 6 (29:10):
So I guess that's another thing I'd be interested
to hear from you about.
What is it like kind ofjuggling this full-time you're
full-time professional andtrying to be there for the boys
and the team and practiceschedules and all of that is
that.
What is that like during thehockey season for you?
Speaker 2 (29:27):
it's chaotic, for sure, um, but no, it's, I love
it, like I wouldn't.
I wouldn't be doing this if Ididn't love it, um, but yeah,
it's, it's definitely a lot,working 40, 50 hours a week and
then coming to the rink.
So I go, go from work to therink, sometimes back to work,
but no, it's, I wouldn't changeit, I love doing it and these
guys make it special and we havea.
(29:48):
We have a good group in theroom this year and not too many
issues and we get the business.
But then outside of the rink,like, we have a good time and,
like I said, I love doing ityeah, let's talk about some
other players on the team.
Speaker 5 (30:01):
Maybe let's talk about your goalie First of all.
Yeah, let's talk about WillNagerwort for a second, because
he is really fun to watch Frommy perspective.
Last night, during the thirdperiod, I kind of stood behind
the net and there was a fewsaves that he made, I'm like,
and that was elite.
There was one blocker save thathe made real late.
That puck was heading rightinto that top corner and he got
it.
Tyler, if you want to starttalk about Will a little bit.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
I mean, Will and I have been super close for super
long.
Him and I seriously, we liveeight houses apart.
So every single day we go andeither I'll take him to school,
he'll take me to school, andit's seriously like family.
My family loves his family I'massuming his family loves my
family.
But I mean, I absolutely lovebeing around, will you seem
fairly pleasant?
Oh, I mean, I love spendingtime with Will.
(30:45):
I sit right next to him in thelocker room and all we do is
joke around.
It's great.
Speaker 5 (30:49):
And, as a hockey goalie crew, what's he like to
have back there?
Speaker 3 (30:53):
Oh yeah, I mean, he's definitely pretty special, he's
definitely gifted and I don'tthink our team is as good
without him.
He's definitely kept us inclose games and kept not so
close games pretty close yeah.
Speaker 6 (31:06):
Have you guys seen him hit a golf ball?
Speaker 3 (31:08):
Oh yeah, he's elite too.
Speaker 6 (31:11):
Oh he's legit.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
I played with him this summer.
He beat me.
Speaker 6 (31:15):
He's legit.
He'll lead our team in thespringtime here.
He's a really good golfer.
How?
Speaker 5 (31:20):
far is he hitting off the team?
Speaker 2 (31:22):
Farther than me.
Speaker 6 (31:24):
He puts it out there.
Speaker 1 (31:25):
He puts it out there.
I've seen him hit 300 before,yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Yeah, willie's awesome.
He's definitely the backbone orthe heart and soul of our team.
Like Cruz said, he's definitelywon us some games, especially
last year.
Just only being a sophomore andpretty much playing every game,
I think he ended up playinglike 22 and a half of our 25 and
, yeah, he stole probably fouror five of those games himself
and then this year like, yeah,he's, he's been awesome.
(31:51):
It's I mean, we had to rely onhim every game.
We only have one, so he's uh.
Speaker 5 (31:55):
Like I said, he's uh yeah, I was checking out that
team picture.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
I didn't see a second set of pads anywhere we have
two younger guys that willpractice with us, so that way we
have two to three goalies everypractice.
Speaker 6 (32:08):
Yeah, so we opened up the podcast today with a little
electric guitar star spangledbanner.
There's another guy, and youknow, hockey is one of those
unique sports where a lot ofprograms are electric guitar
Star Spangled Banner.
There's another guy.
Hockey is one of those uniquesports where a lot of programs
are co-op.
You've got multiple schoolscoming together.
Can you talk a little bit aboutCharlie Moncoun, our Black
(32:30):
River representative, and whathe brings to the team other than
those luscious locks?
Speaker 3 (32:35):
I know he's pretty special.
He's a big PK guy, he's aworkhorse like.
He gets hit probably just asmuch as tegan and he draws
penalties, like if you want apower play, you got to put
charlie out there and he'll drawyou one.
But yeah, he's a character, forsure he's.
I mean one time my car uh shutdown here at the rink and he
jump started in with hiselectric guitar yeah, maybe but
(32:57):
no, uh, I I would have no idea.
He knows everything and he's asenior and I talk to him a lot
and he gives me pretty goodadvice, so he's great.
Speaker 5 (33:07):
Yeah, you've got some other seniors on the team,
right, so we've got Aarons.
We just talked about Charlie.
How about Moore?
He's graduating this year.
Are you good friends with himtoo?
Speaker 1 (33:21):
I mean you guys all are close.
Yeah, ethan moore is seriouslya brother from another mother.
Speaker 5 (33:23):
He was seriously.
There's always one.
As long as you have somebody inyour life that is that guy.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
It's a good thing like seriously, just today we
had the workout with frank andhe called I'm driving home, I'm
going to walgreens to go buy aknee brace.
He calls me and goes hey, can Icome over to your house for a
little bit?
Go shoot some pucks.
And I was like, yeah, sure Iwon't be there.
And then, not thinking anythingof it, I didn't see his car in
the driveway and I called himand was like, hey, did you come
(33:47):
over?
He's like, yeah, I was at yourhouse by myself and I was just
shooting pucks and I left beforeyou got back.
So hopefully that out of ourhouse he's just another kid in
our family.
I absolutely love being aroundEthan.
He's super funny.
Speaker 6 (34:04):
We touched on it a little bit earlier about the
brotherhood that is within theprogram right now.
Dan Diodana from the HollandSentinel did a really nice
article for us a couple of weeksago talking about all the
combination and the brothercombos.
All three of you are part ofthat combination Coach combos.
You guys are well, all three ofyou are are part of that
combination coach.
Maybe you can give us a starthere.
What has that been like, kindof not only coaching with your
(34:28):
brother but then coaching a teamthat has so many brother combos
within it?
Speaker 2 (34:32):
yeah, it's uh.
I could talk about the teampart first.
I've never been anything, I'venever had anything like it.
I've I played on teams where weonly had maybe one set of
brothers.
So seeing this is prettyspecial, it's crazy.
It's a half-hour roster, it'sjust brothers.
And then, yeah, being able tocoach my brothers, it's
different Like I've never.
We've always missed each otherby a year.
(34:53):
We're four years apart, butwe're also four grades apart.
So we never.
In high school I graduated, hebecame a freshman and then in
college we both went to GrandValley, but I had graduated and
then he came in to Grand Valley.
So, yeah, we just missed eachother by a year.
I mean, we grew up playinghockey with each other down in
the basement and stuff like that, but we never actually did
(35:15):
anything hockey-related in anorganization.
So having him is pretty cool.
He definitely gets the shortend of the stick between myself
and Darren because he's mybrother, so it's a little bit
easier to snap on him than tosnap on a couple of other people
.
Speaker 5 (35:34):
You can always go at your brother no questions asked,
because you've done it beforeand you'll do it again and
tomorrow will be just fine,right, right, yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
So there's been a couple incidents the last two
years with that, but he takes itwell and he just moves on.
Speaker 5 (35:48):
All right.
So we've got you and yourbrother Crew.
You have you and Cray.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
Yep.
Yeah so I think it's definitelybeen pretty cool.
I think he's progressed thisyear for sure, just gaining more
confidence, but like just thewhole team wise with the
brotherhood.
I think it helps with chemistryso much because we all know
each other so well and like justto have a guy you can kind of
rely on, just because you knowhim so well, definitely helps.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
Yeah, I mean to tie into that like everyone's in a
super good mental space thisyear.
I feel like everyone's got agood friend to sit with at lunch
, everyone's got someone to talkto and I feel like outside of
the rink that's super, superimportant.
But going into more me andEthan's relationship, I feel
like especially the car rideshome even after like a bad game
or even a good game.
I remember the first game hescored on the road.
(36:34):
I remember sitting in the truckand just going crazy or playing
some music, told dad we weregonna go get ice cream it was
super awesome to just have himin the car and just know like,
hey, we're living in the samehousehold, we're sleeping under
the same roof, like that'ssomeone to be proud of, so yeah
that's awesome.
Speaker 5 (36:49):
And then also, as you got, uh, nate and eli bean and
then connor and aiden reedy, soit's, it's really something.
You know what I?
Uh, I hadn't watched you playthis year until I went to the
jenison game, and what's reallyfunny is that it stood out there
.
So, as I mean, I'm not lookingat a program, I think I'm like,
wait a minute.
I saw that name twice, I sawthat name again, I saw that name
again.
(37:09):
It was like the same names keptrepeating themselves.
Then I pull out the program.
Sure enough, it's, everybody'sgot a brother on the team.
It's pretty crazy, crazy.
Let's get into the some of thefun things about hockey, cause
hockey has so many really fun,cool things that are kind of
part of the culture.
First we're going to go to thehair, which is also known I
think I'm I'm an old guy, so ifI'm wrong on this, let me know
(37:31):
but it's also known as the flowor the lettuce.
Yeah, who has the best hair onthe team?
Best hair?
Speaker 3 (37:40):
Best hockey hair.
Speaker 5 (37:41):
We'll go hockey hair first.
Hockey hair Is there anybodybut Charlie?
I mean yours comes out of yourhelmet crew a little bit, I was
watching last night I could seeit.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
Yeah, I mean, if Will wore a player helmet, he'd have
the best hair.
That's my opinion.
Speaker 5 (37:54):
Oh, no, kidding yeah.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
And then I got a shout out to the freshman.
I got to go, eli Bean.
That middle part's pretty sick.
I will say, oh, he's got themiddle part, yeah, he's got it.
Speaker 5 (38:02):
No, kidding it looks nice.
All right, all right, so a fewdifferent ones there.
Another part of hockey, ofcourse, is suits on game day.
You guys do that regularly,coach.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Yeah, for the most part, much wears a suit every
day.
Speaker 3 (38:15):
yeah, yeah, on the home games we do suits, and then
on the away games we do likepretty much the same stuff.
It's just a woe jacket insteadof a suit.
Speaker 6 (38:22):
Oh, that's pretty nice, yeah, and who suits in the
in the building over the years?
Like dudes go all out likethey're just not throwing a suit
on, like they are getting afterit.
I mean some necklaces, yeah, isit?
Speaker 5 (38:37):
there's no need to look bad if you're putting a
suit on, especially hockeyplayers.
There's a lot that goes on withhockey and having that suit on
for hockey is sweet.
Who does the suit the best onthe team coach in your opinion.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
I don't know.
A lot of guys have some goodones.
I'll give Kru some credit.
He rocks the floods a littlebit at the bottom, so show off
the ankles.
Speaker 6 (39:04):
Nice.
Is that just because youhaven't upgraded your pant game
I?
Speaker 3 (39:09):
would say mostly my mom.
She doesn't really like it whenthe pants are too high on me,
so leave it at that.
I don't think it looks too bad.
I guess Coach kind of likes ittoo Good style.
Speaker 5 (39:21):
There's a lot of tradition hockey too with
pregame meals putting onequipment, taping your stick.
What do your guys go to mealspregame?
Speaker 1 (39:29):
Every single game, jimmy John's, jimmy John's
sandwich and a bag of chips.
It's like seriously, you go askany one of the brothers on the
team like every single kid walksinto the rink with jimmy johns
every single kid, yeah and Ithink I gotta shout out to my
mom here.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
She's a great cook, so pretty much whatever she
makes for me I'll eat.
But uh, we've been going withchicken alfredo for this season.
It's been been working prettywell, I'd say.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
But yeah, I mean shout out to her you're gonna
talk about your lunchbox at all,or?
Speaker 3 (39:56):
oh yeah.
Yeah, she makes me a prettygood lunch too.
It keeps me fueled for the day,but yeah, she's great.
Gotta love moms, man, yeah mangotta love moms.
Speaker 5 (40:04):
Anybody quirky with uh, you know, stick taping or
the order putting on equipment.
You notice anything like that,coach?
Anybody quirky that way?
Speaker 2 (40:11):
no, I I kind of stay out of the room when the boys
are in there.
I think that's important forthem to have their time together
and, um, like our, our coachingoffice is on the other side of
the hall so we're quite far away, and then for game times and
stuff like that.
the coaches pretty much hang outon the outside.
We give these boys some spaceand it's good for them to have
an hour to themselves and closedoors and just talk as a group
(40:33):
and just be younger guys andhave some fun in the room.
Speaker 5 (40:39):
That's pretty cool that you do that, you guys.
That's is that.
Does every coach do that?
Speaker 3 (40:44):
uh, I don't necessarily know, but it
definitely gives us time to likementally lock in, I would say,
just because we just focus onwhatever we're thinking about.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
But yeah, I mean, yeah, there's some coaches that
do that, but with the equipmentdressing, there's some guys that
have their routines.
Like Kyler Comet's got to bedressed 30 minutes before the
game no kidding.
Speaker 2 (41:04):
Every single game.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
He walked out of the room yesterday before any of us
even went into the room.
Speaker 5 (41:09):
He's got full gear on .
Speaker 2 (41:10):
Yeah, the guy gets dressed in like five minutes,
that's crazy Well he is a ballof energy, that's to say energy.
Speaker 6 (41:23):
That's a state of the least he was at.
Uh, you know, we started somestudent run um live streams now
and he's part of this kind ofgroup of kids in wobian that are
doing some live streams and hewas there for the first one the
other night.
Man bouncing off the wall, he'sgot a hundred ideas throwing
them at me.
I'm like kyler man, we gottaslow down.
This is the first live streamlike that's baby steps, baby.
Speaker 2 (41:40):
Is he on the penalty killing unit?
Yeah, he's out there, he's onthe PK.
Speaker 5 (41:44):
Yeah, that would help .
It's a good place for a guywith high energy.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
I'm not a big rah-rah guy myself, so I'm happy we
have Kyler.
Speaker 5 (41:54):
Well, you know what I noticed yesterday too.
Do you remember Jacques Demersway back in the day?
I know Red Wing coach butanyways but I you're sitting,
you're standing there and I meanit's getting hectic in the
third period, like they're inthe zone a lot.
There's a number of times whereit's like we couldn't you know
you couldn't clear the zone.
The puck staying in it's goodand you're like just very stoic,
taking your time Does.
(42:15):
Does his calmness calm you guysdown?
Speaker 3 (42:18):
yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
I mean to be honest, like 100%.
Honestly.
Speaker 3 (42:22):
I'm not really paying attention to Tom, I'm just kind
of doing my own thing, but Imean it's definitely okay, it's
definitely nice to not have himlike yelling at someone the
whole time, like getting onsomeone's butt about something
yeah, I think for sure likeespecially like when I make a
mistake it's better that he'smore calm and trying to help me
fix it, rather than justscreaming at me and telling me I
did bad.
So that's definitely prettyhelpful.
Speaker 5 (42:45):
Best shot on the team Tyler.
Who's got it?
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Crew Anderson for sure, I know 100% he's in the
lab.
Speaker 5 (42:51):
He's in the lab.
Two bucks, coach, best passer.
Yeah, probably knobs.
Hmm, nice, best skater crewwell true, 100%.
Speaker 2 (43:02):
We got some decent, we got some good guys.
Yeah, knobs good skater crew'sa good skater.
Give Eli Bean, yeah, there too,pretty quick.
I mean, yeah, I mean, if youcan't skate, you can't really
play no, you can't, you have toskate.
Speaker 6 (43:14):
Yeah, that's why I can't play hockey.
Yeah, you gotta.
Speaker 5 (43:16):
That's why I can't play hockey.
You've got to be able to skate.
Funniest guy on the team Kuro.
Who is it?
Speaker 3 (43:23):
In some moments I think I've got to give it to
Kyler just because he's the bigenergy guy.
He's always buzzing.
And then I think Tegan's prettyfunny and Kray has some good
one-liners.
He's kind of known around theroom as that.
He just randomly pops in, saysa quick one and he's out and
then we're all just laughingthat's pretty great if you can
pull off the one liner and leavethe room.
Speaker 2 (43:40):
Yeah, I'm gonna agree with the cray one.
Like last year, he didn'treally talk much.
It was hard to get him to openup, but even like, even like
we're trying to have like aserious meeting or something
along those lines he always, healways found a way to like kind
of slip in like a one-liner andI just couldn't keep myself from
laughing and he's really openedup this year.
There's more and moreone-liners coming out.
Speaker 6 (44:00):
He's hilarious Dirtiest locker.
Speaker 1 (44:05):
Ethan Moore.
Oh, my goodness, we got thesnack.
We got the refrigerator inthere with Gatorades.
Every single time it's oneempty Gatorade bottle.
Got some Goldfish wrappers inthere, or something?
Ethan Moore?
Speaker 3 (44:17):
He's pretty much got the trash can in his locker.
He's not been cleaning it toomuch, I'll say.
Speaker 5 (44:24):
There's lots of some other fun things of hockey.
Of course you've got your busrides, especially when you get a
charter.
That's always a great part ofhockey just chilling like that.
I always love the hockey teamphoto.
I played hockey when I was, Ithink, until about age 15.
But I always remember justhaving that team photo was
always really fun.
You guys got a great team photohere.
That's a pretty good one, yeah,I kind of look like a doofus.
Speaker 4 (44:44):
I don't know why.
Speaker 2 (44:44):
I wore a hat.
Oh, you do have the hat on.
Speaker 5 (44:47):
Your beard's not really in there either, is it?
Speaker 2 (44:50):
No.
Speaker 5 (44:50):
Or is it, Maybe it is .
Anyways, I always like thehockey team photo.
It was just kind of a greatthing.
It's a very weird thing to doas a hockey player to sit there
with your skates and your glovesand sit like that.
It's kind of weird.
Speaker 6 (45:02):
Last year's fake mustaches were some of my
favorite that I've ever seen ina photo.
Speaker 2 (45:07):
Worst things.
I've seen Waukes and BrondykeWaukes and Brondyke.
They had maybe five hairs ontheir lip and they took some
mascara to it.
Speaker 5 (45:18):
It was so good.
Oh, that's pretty classic.
There's one other thing I wantto do about hockey.
What, uh, being a fan of hockey, what a great part of what
hockey is the sounds of hockey.
There's not other sports thathave these sounds.
This is one of my favorite.
I mean, it's the horn.
(45:55):
You know it's a goal.
That's actually crew, that'syour goal versus jenison on
senior night actually.
Speaker 3 (46:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (46:00):
So that was pretty awesome.
Speaker 6 (46:02):
We comboed with Hope a couple of years ago to get the
horn in to try to add thatatmosphere to our home ice.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
Oh yeah, that's great .
Yeah, it's nice to hear when itgoes off.
Speaker 3 (46:12):
Yeah, it's definitely pretty cool.
I don't know many other highschools that have that and,
especially because it's justkind of ours, it's like the
sound you know when you hearthat sound, there's been a goal
scored for West Ottawa, so it'spretty cool.
Speaker 5 (46:22):
You know what's cool?
I was checking out on Spotifythe other day and I was going
just through.
Every like NHL team has adifferent style of horn.
Speaker 3 (46:33):
It's just a little bit different.
I didn't know that unique sound, but yeah, it's pretty cool to
have, for sure.
Speaker 5 (46:39):
Then you go to a neutral game yesterday and
there's nothing.
Yeah, it kind of just takesaway from the nature of hockey a
little bit.
Speaker 6 (46:47):
So this is the first year that we, as kind of OK
Conference, have come togetherand put this tournament together
.
From an AD's perspective, it'sa logistical nightmare because
we're trying to figure out bustimes like 12 hours before we
need a bus.
We've got to make sure that thehome team's got to provide the
trainer, the away team's got toprovide the scores table people,
(47:10):
so there's a lot of movingpieces.
What's it been like for youguys to kind of go through it
for the first time and have thiskind of tournament mentality?
Our thought was that it wouldprepare our teams better for
postseason.
Speaker 2 (47:22):
I really like it.
I think it's pretty cool.
It's a lot better than what wedid last year, right, like you
kind of just play your games andit's kind of over.
Now it kind of gives you achance to actually play for
something.
So I think it's good for ourgroup too, especially like Kruen
mentioned earlier.
We've left a lot on the tablekind of so far this season on a
couple of games, and now it kindof gives these guys something
(47:44):
to play for and gears us up forregionals right.
So I I like it a lot andhopefully they decide to keep
going with it yeah, I think Ithink it's here to stay.
Speaker 6 (47:53):
It's interesting to hear you guys, crew.
What do you, what do you thinkI?
Speaker 3 (47:55):
think it definitely helps, like our mindset, like
it's win only, like because ifyou lose, like you'll play, but
I mean you're out of thecontention for playing for
something.
And then that definitely leadsinto like regionals, for example
, where you just have to win, oryour season.
Speaker 1 (48:08):
So for sure that definitely helps I mean I just
love the mentality of, hey,we're gonna go play a tournament
, like, pack your bags, we'regonna go play, and I absolutely
love that.
And I also like that it's at adifferent rink and it's kind of
mutual.
So I do enjoy that, mostlybecause there's games before,
there's games after.
You can kind of see everythingthat's going on.
I love the atmosphere of it.
Speaker 6 (48:30):
And it's given us a great opportunity to avenge a
loss from earlier in the seasonagainst our rivals from up the
road, kind of.
What are your thoughts as we gointo that tomorrow night, coach
?
Speaker 2 (48:42):
My big one is going to be we've got to stay
disciplined.
We got ourselves in sometrouble in that game.
We went down early 3-0 withsome penalty trouble, and I
think if we clean that up we'llbe all right.
We went up, going down I thinkit was 5-1, and then we climbed
back 5-4.
And we had a chance to tie itand the crew actually put one
off the post with eight secondsleft.
(49:04):
So that goes an inch out of theway.
We tied it up 5-5.
And we take it to OT and maybegood things happen there.
But yeah, our big thing isgoing to have to stay
disciplined and just stick toour plan but stay out of the box
.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
I'm super excited for the Grand Haven game just
because I can't stand losing tosome of my good buddies Playing
Ice Dogs.
There's a lot of kids fromGrand Haven that played for the
Ice Dogs as well and it's kindof cool Got split up.
Some of the kids are at WestOttawa, some of the kids are at
Grand Haven.
It's like, hey, I'm playingagainst one of my good buddies
from up the street, so I can'tstand losing to them, so I would
love to beat them yeah, it'lldefinitely be pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (49:41):
I will say I didn't really have like the smartest
game wise.
I think I definitely got intosome of that discipline trouble,
that game, which definitelycosts us, but it'll be cool to
get some revenge, hopefully, andplay my game.
Speaker 5 (49:51):
So yeah, all right.
Well, let's get in close tohockey time.
It's uh 4 24.
You guys are both to have topull a Kyler comment to get on
ice by four 30, five minutes.
There's so much more we couldtalk about but we don't have
time.
But it was great sitting downwith the three of you.
A real pleasure to meet all ofyou, really really nice to do.
Just remember everybody, we areWest Ottawa, we are community,
(50:13):
we are each other.
Game um, this tournament willbe wrapped up and this will
probably air after that, butthere's more hockey coming up
and we wish you guys all thebest.
Speaker 1 (50:20):
Uh, moving forward so thanks for taking time with us,
thank you.
Thank you, guys, so much thanksguys.
everyone's in a super good mental space this year.
I feel like everyone's got agood friend to sit with at lunch
, everyone's got someone to talkto and I feel like outside of
the rink that's super, superimportant.
But going into more me andEthan's relationship, I feel
like especially the car rideshome even after like a bad game
or even a good game.
I remember the first game hescored on the road.
I remember sitting in the truckand just going crazy or playing
(00:22):
some music I.
But I remember sitting in thetruck and just going crazy or
playing some music.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
I told dad we were going to go get ice cream.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
It was super awesome to just have him in the car and
just know like, hey, we'reliving in the same household,
we're sleeping under the sameroof.
That's someone to be proud of.
Speaker 4 (00:37):
Hey everybody, this is Rodney Valinga with the West
Ottawa High School AthleticProgram and you're listening to
the 29.1 Podcast 29 sports, oneteam, the show that brings you
into the lives of studentathletes, coaches and other
faces in the Panther sportscommunity, Bringing you the
stories you might otherwisenever hear.
(00:59):
Join myself and AthleticDirector Bill Kennedy as we dive
in with you to get to know eachother a little bit better.
Speaker 5 (01:12):
Five sets of brothers all on one team, From the head
coaches all the way down to theentire roster, Panther Hockey is
a brotherhood.
Speaker 6 (01:20):
Today we are joined by Panther Hockey coach Tom
Carey, senior Tyler Noblet andjunior Crew Anderson Fresh off a
first-round win in the OKConference Tournament.
The boys join us to talk aboutthe season thus far and look
ahead to a big rivalry gameagainst Grand Haven.
Speaker 5 (01:35):
Whether it's Jimmy Johns and a bag of chips, or
spending time in the labperfecting their shots, these
guys do it together Coach TomCarey, senior Tyler Noblet and
Junior Crew Anderson.
Speaker 6 (01:46):
Up next on the 29.1 Podcast.
Speaker 5 (01:48):
Let's get it you've been to a west auto varsity home
(02:15):
game.
That's the sound that'sfamiliar to you senior assistant
captain charlie mon coonripping out the star spangled
banner on electric guitar on theice, on skates.
He's got his amp near the homebench.
It's a great way to get a gamestarted and, uh, even better way
to start off this podcast.
Uh well, welcome, uh, toanother episode of the 29 one
(02:35):
podcast.
I'm your host, rodney valenga.
I'm just a west ottawa parent,like many of you listening, and
I'm here with former francisscott key high school outside
linebacker William Lee KennedyIV correct, that's right.
Also known as Athletic DirectorBill Kennedy.
It's no doubt winter, and ithas been for a while.
Today we have three members ofthe West Ottawa Varsity Hockey
(02:58):
Team with us.
They are coming off a reallybig OK Red Conference tournament
win last night and are graciousenough to join us today.
And it's our pleasure to askwho is it?
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Tyler Noblet.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Curry, anderson, tom Carey.
Speaker 6 (03:14):
Awesome, Super pumped to have you guys here today.
Check the score as soon as Iget up this morning to make sure
that we were all going to be ina good mood as we got together
as we had this scheduled Big winto get us into the semifinal
the conference tournament, andwe have a little bit of a rival
waiting for us on Friday night,so super fired up for that.
Speaker 5 (03:37):
Yeah, we're excited for that and we're also excited
to kind of be here.
We are taking the 29-1 podcaston the road.
You guys are are.
Where are we fellas at the?
Speaker 3 (03:47):
at the rink at griff's yeah and uh, the hope
film room it looks like yes uh,griff's ice house west, this
north side of holland, just offat 31.
Speaker 5 (03:57):
Have you guys been in this room before?
Speaker 1 (03:59):
uh yeah, we've done a lot of film up here before,
especially growing up playingfor the ice dogs.
Sometimes we'll get the roomand be able to do film upstairs
and it's a sweet place to be Ilove.
We've done a lot of film uphere before especially growing
up playing for the Ice Dogs.
Sometimes we'll get the room andbe able to do film upstairs and
it's a sweet place to be.
I love being up here.
You were doing film as an IceDog.
How old were you when you weredoing that?
I mean ages from like 9 to 15.
Whenever we get the chance tocome up here, we'd come up and
(04:20):
try and do film up on the TVthey have up here.
Speaker 6 (04:25):
No kidding, this is the first episode of the 29-1
not recorded at West Ottawa HighSchool.
So you guys are pioneers in thepodcast space on the road.
Speaker 5 (04:32):
Coach, this is pretty much your guys' second home
during this.
What, from November forward, atleast with this team, right oh?
Speaker 2 (04:38):
for sure.
Yeah, I mean, I pretty muchlive here.
It seems like and same withthese guys.
Speaker 5 (04:46):
Crew.
What's the craziest time you'vebeen at this arena?
Either day or night, it's.
What time is it right now wegot what little after 3 3 in the
afternoon.
What are some of the craziesttimes a day you've been in this
building?
Speaker 3 (04:56):
we did a lock-in for ice dogs like my travel team, I
think, a couple years back, andwe were here all night oh, let's
go.
I think we got on the ice atlike 2 am for a little skate and
uh, yeah, that was pretty fun.
We've been here crazy times,though.
Speaker 5 (05:12):
For sure, yeah, ice is cheaper at 2 am oh, yeah,
probably let's talk about, uh,last night's win, um, last
night's wins got you to what?
8, 11-11-1.
I went on max preps.
Hopefully that's accurate.
That was a really big win lastnight, hard-fought win against
Forest Hills Eastern Northern.
Scoreless first period to startcrew.
(05:33):
What was the pace of that gameearly on?
Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yeah, I mean there was a bunch of chances here and
there, but good goalie for them.
And then we also had Willie AnnNett, so that kept us in it.
But yeah, I mean we werelooking to get one and then
started the second.
We got one pretty early on thepower play and then finished
with another.
Speaker 5 (05:51):
So yeah, pretty good.
I want to personally thank theAnderson brothers for doing the
goals that we're going to talkabout the brotherhood of this
team a little bit later.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
So you guys scoring too, tell me about those second
period goals they were superawesome to be a part of being
crew score his like our secondgoal of the game that it shot
seriously iced in my veins and Iwas super excited to see him
score and throw his hands up.
So it was a really good feeling, especially getting up to well
in the second period so that wassuper awesome for us.
Speaker 5 (06:22):
Coach you get to that third period will's playing
really nice and that he wasstanding on his head a little
bit last night.
Uh, they score what four orfive minutes into the third
period.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
Then you guys really got to go to work yeah, we, we
talked about going in, uh, goinginto the third period in the
room that we're trying to keepit from being a game all over
again where you're up to nothingand coming back out there and
kind of get a little loose inthat first couple shifts and try
and just keep the pace our wayand of course three, four
minutes in we give up one andour heels are kind of pressed
(06:54):
and they gave it to us for acouple minutes there and we
ended up calling a timeout lateand I think it was like five,
six minutes left in the thirdand readjusted some of our four
check in our neutral zone andkind of went to a 1-3-1 and was
able to hold them off and thenmade it interesting for the last
30 seconds or so with thetripping down there with
(07:16):
somebody sitting here, yeah.
Speaker 5 (07:17):
I saw hey man, I was behind the net watching.
I'm like where was that penalty?
Was it a trip?
Yeah.
I definitely got him.
That was bad.
Well, you had to with 12seconds left.
I mean you can't let them get ascoring chance that late in the
game.
Speaker 6 (07:33):
Yeah, and then we're going to turn around after the
conference tournament and we'regoing to see these guys again
next week prior to heading intoregionals.
What is that like?
Kind of circling back andgetting to see that team again?
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Yeah, I mean we know what to expect from like a four
check or a neutral zone kind ofstandpoint, but I mean anything
can really happen.
I know they were down theirstarting goalie, I think.
So you know they could come outstronger.
Speaker 5 (07:55):
But yeah, I mean we'll see that was a really they
have some really big players,some of those forwards.
I mean, can we?
Just give a kudos to TeganJohnson for a minute.
Pound for pound.
This kid is tough, tyler, maybeyou can talk about him a little
bit.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
I've been playing hockey with Tegan seriously,
like nine years in a row.
We've been on the same teamgrowing up all throughout,
playing Highland Ice Dogs andplaying West Ottawa.
It's been a crazy experience,had the ups and downs, but he's
always, pound for pound, had themost amount of effort I've ever
seen out of a hockey player.
Coach, what do you think abouthim?
Speaker 2 (08:33):
Yeah, he's been great .
I mean, he's really filled amuch bigger role this year.
He was probably right aroundour 50 last year and now he's
moving his way into the topthree.
He's getting a lot of minutesand, yeah, he's playing great
he's.
He's a lot tougher in thecorners and moving pucks up the
ice and, yeah, I've nevercoached a kid that gets hit as
much as he does, but he getsback up and gets out to the next
(08:55):
shift.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
So yeah, he took a big hit in that third period
over on those far boards and hewas down for I don't know 30, 40
seconds or so.
It's crazy how long it takesbecause a trainer is going out
on their running shoes orwhatever.
I mean, if you're going down inhockey, you're down for a
little bit, right, tyler?
I mean no one's getting therequick, I mean it always sucks
going down.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
It's a little embarrassing, but I mean, if you
can't stand up, you've got tostay down.
Make sure you're doing okay andjust play it safe at that point
you know, and you got hit inthat third period.
Speaker 5 (09:25):
I think you hit legs with somebody right.
Speaker 1 (09:26):
Yeah Over by the circle.
Yeah, he hit me clean, but Imean, I just had a little
knee-on-knee contact and then Ihad knee issues before that.
So I mean, just re-injuringwhat already happened, I went in
the locker room, I threw abrace on that I thought I didn't
need put a bunch of tape on itand said you know, I'm going to
suck it up and try and play therest of this game.
And that's hockey, ladies andgentlemen.
Speaker 6 (09:47):
Especially you get to this point of the high school
season.
You know we're a couple ofweeks away from postseason
starting.
There's virtually nobody in thelocker room.
Coach that's walking around100% at this point of the year,
right.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
No, we've been battling injuries all year,
which is tough.
We lost Carson at the Jenisongame so we're missing him for
the last five games.
Now Tyler took a knee-on-kneeagainst Caledonia so we lost him
for that game and then took aweek off.
It was kind of scary yesterdayseeing him take another knee and
then trying to figure out if hecan go or not.
(10:20):
But that's just the heart thatTyler has playing on basically
one leg all day yesterday, notall day, but that's just the
heart that Tyler has playing onbasically one leg all day
yesterday and not all day, butin the third.
So it's great to see these guys.
They want to get out there andget whatever they got banging up
, injuries or whatever it is.
Speaker 5 (10:33):
Yeah, I noticed you went to the locker room right to
check on him.
Yeah, for sure I saw you leavethe bench.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
I gave Darren the reins for the five minutes and
went in and checked on Tyler tosee what he wanted to do and I
said, hey, it's up to you, it'syour call.
Like, if you want to go, I'llput you out there, if you don't,
then you can just hang out onthe bench.
And he's like no, I'm going, socrew you're uh, he's in the
locker room.
Speaker 5 (10:53):
You're trying to hold the fort for your team.
What's it like seeing him comeon and back to the bench and
jumping over the boards there?
Speaker 3 (10:58):
yeah, it's definitely a spark we needed.
You know, he's a prettyelectric forward, to say the
least, so that definitely helped, especially with, like him,
being a good buddy of mine.
Don't want to ever see him hurt.
Speaker 5 (11:08):
So right, yeah, it was good, let's get to you guys
a little bit.
Coach your second year here atwest ottawa, 30 years old, so
nice young coach.
It must be nice for a player tohave a younger coach.
Uh, talk about who yourassistants are and how.
That's kind of cool yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
So so we have Darren, who is a West auto grad.
He coached prior to me comingin.
So I gave, he called me and hewas like, hey, I really want to
keep going.
And I was like, all right,that's fine, like we'll do a
summer trial.
And I think I had him on thebench for one day and and talk
to him right afterwards and said, yeah, we're good.
Speaker 5 (11:42):
You knew right away, I knew right away, that's nice.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Just a couple of things that he was saying on the
bench.
He was engaged, the kids allliked him.
He knows what he's talkingabout, so that goes a long way.
Then my brother is our other.
He's our D coach.
That's your little brother,right?
Yeah, middle brother.
Speaker 1 (12:03):
Did we say younger or ?
Speaker 5 (12:04):
little.
I was always called the littlebrother by my bigger brother and
I always took offense to that.
So you guys are pretty niceguys.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
Yeah, I say younger, I mean Dan's not much, he's not
little anymore.
He probably can take me now, sohe's definitely a little bit
bigger than I am.
These guys like to give himgrief.
Speaker 5 (12:18):
You played a lot of hockey yourself growing up right
.
You played over on the eastside of the state.
Can you tell us a little bitabout your playing career?
Speaker 2 (12:24):
yeah, so I'm.
I'm from livonia.
So on the east side, um startedgotten skates at three and
played for livonia growing upand then played at victory honda
and then played four years atlivonia churchill and then went
over and played one year incanada and then, uh, went right
to the acha after that, afterrealizing that, yeah, I was just
(12:45):
to play in a subway D3 andcouldn't really afford it.
So, yeah, I went to the ACHAand nothing better.
Speaker 6 (12:51):
Yeah, my nephew actually got to play juniors in
Canada for a couple of years,lived with a couple of families
and then played out in LongBeach, california, for a while,
got traded to a team in Chicago.
He's actually playing for ateam out of Alpena right now.
Interestingly enough, though,like growing up, he was a goalie
from Alabama Huntsville, sowhere UAH really kind of started
(13:15):
their hockey program.
Junior hockey is just a crazyworld, right, and you guys have
aspirations, junior hockey.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
I mean like moving forward.
I would love to haveaspirations.
Junior hockey I mean likemoving forward, I would love to
go play junior hockey.
Obviously college is in thefuture, but if I could get like
a little taste of some tier two,tier three juniors, I would
love to be able to do that yeah,yeah and I think to.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
To play at the college level?
I want to.
I think juniors is a step Ineed to take and it's been.
It's been good.
I know ty Tyler and I have bothbeen able to practice with the
junior team out of this rink,the Fresh Coast Freeze, so
that's been pretty good just toget a feel for it, but yeah yeah
, I saw them at the jenison game.
Speaker 5 (13:55):
They were out in the crowd.
I didn't know who was there.
So just because I know hockey alittle bit, I know when people
show up in suits there'ssomebody yeah you know what I
mean.
So the fresh coast.
Uh, what, I'm not saying itwrong, what's it called?
Again, fresh coast freeze, itis okay, so it's fresh, because
they were there in suits.
I'm like, okay, I've gotsomebody here today, so how do
you guys feel about having?
Uh, what do you guys?
What do you guys like aboutyour coach?
I like about your coach andlike about your coaching staff I
(14:16):
love tom.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
Tom's always got a different kind of energy than
stone did, because I played mysophomore year we had a
different coach and tom justbrought a different, more
level-headed kind of energy tothe game and kind of showed me
like, hey, hockey can be reallysimple, hockey can be really fun
if all you got to do is trustme.
And tom definitely brings thataspect of hey, I'm a guy, just
(14:38):
do what I say and we'll moveforward.
Drew.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Yeah, I think one good thing is just the age we
already kind of talked about.
They're all good friends withthem, but also we're here to
play hockey and they're all goodcoaches.
They know what they're talkingabout.
And then also when we're in theoffseason, I'll text Tom almost
every day with questions,whether that's like shooting
form or just like teams andstuff like that, and he's always
there to answer and kind ofhelp me out with that.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
So well, speaking of shooting, I was able to talk to
your pops on the phone the otherday and he's.
I said hey, tell me a littleabout crew.
I don't really know him at all.
You have a setup in your garagethat is quite extraordinary.
I heard right.
Can you give me the breakdown?
The breakdown, uh, your dadsaid you practice at least 200
shots a day, at least seven daysa week, sometimes eight days a
week, apparently.
Uh, what's it like in thatgarage, yours?
Speaker 3 (15:24):
yeah, I call it the lab.
You know I'll work on whateverI want, but I got a couple pads
and pull them out in thedriveway and then I got a tarp
in the garage and a couple netsand about 200 pucks and call it
good.
So yeah, and then my dad alsoset up like a speaker system.
So I got that going for me tooand it's been fun.
And then I've also been able tohave a couple friends come over
(15:45):
and teammates too, so get themgoing on shots.
But yeah, I think that'sdefinitely been a a good thing
for my shot, especially Tyleryou uh, uh, taken, been over
there check that out.
Speaker 5 (15:56):
Oh yeah, I've been invited.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
I've.
I remember the first time crewhad me over to shoot, he was
like alright, do you guys wantto just mess around or do
shooting drills?
I was like shooting drills, Iwas a little intimidated at
first and we ended up gettingthrough it.
But I just remember 1% betterevery day and that's a prime
example of that.
Speaker 6 (16:14):
We need a sign in there that says the Lab that is
legit.
Speaker 5 (16:20):
What's really funny, too, is when you love a sport
like that's not work to you.
Is it like you're as pureenjoyment?
Speaker 3 (16:25):
right.
Yeah, it's something I do in myfree time.
I mean, obviously, like if Ihad a bad game or miss a certain
shot, I'll work on that, butother time it's just.
It's just the want to getbetter or just to have fun.
Speaker 5 (16:36):
Really, your dad also had.
Like, everybody has an originstory when they start a sport,
right, like, how did you begin?
So can you tell me if you stillremember this?
He said you probably will thedouble stroller moment at a
community arena.
Do you remember that?
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Yeah, so it was my older sister.
It was back in Detroit where wegrew up and it was like a dance
studio or something like that,connected to a hockey rink, and
I think my older sister wasthere, and then I ended up like
wandering off and I think Iended up in the rink.
My mom caught me there and Ijust told her that I wanted to
skate, and then I think I waslike three or two at that time
(17:14):
and then I just kind of grewfrom there, I guess, yeah, yeah
at that time and then, and thenI just kind of grew from there.
Speaker 5 (17:18):
I guess yeah, yeah, it's pretty classic.
I just have all these likeinteresting stories how somebody
gets started.
Um coach, big move for him thisyear moving from playing
forward back to defense.
Can we, can you talk about hima little bit being able to do
that for the team and what itmeans?
Speaker 2 (17:35):
yeah, um, I think it was a tough sell at first.
I think we started at mona.
We were struggling and we werehaving issues trying to get
pucks out of our zone and crewwasn't really getting the puck a
whole lot up at the wing.
So going into like that, didyou going into the third, we
kind of just said, no, I'm just,we're just gonna try it out.
I mean, crew can handle thepuck, he's a good skater, he's a
(17:56):
big body, like yeah, we'll justtoss him back there and see how
he does.
And it was crazy.
He went from maybe touching thepuck like for 10, 15 seconds to
shift to now the puck's on hisstick for 20, 30 seconds and he
does a really good job of buyinghimself time and coming back
and finding the small areasbeing able to get pucks out of
our zone, able to get pucks outof our zone.
(18:18):
So it's, it's crazy how what ofa difference it's made and and
it was a tough sell for him atfirst.
But and we, uh, we we joked.
I joked with them at theChelsea showcase that I was like
crew, you've had two goals as aforward in nine games and now
you got six or seven as adefenseman in nine games.
So I think we're doing theright things here yeah, that was
a tough sell for you.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
Yeah, for sure, because sure.
Because I mean at home I'm justtraining to be a forward, just
like shot and the drills I do.
And then also like in the fallseason, like I played MDHL,
which is that league, and I wasa forward the whole time.
I was pretty successful there.
So I didn't know, like, what myfuture would look like as a D.
To say so, it was definitely alittle bit rough, especially,
definitely a little bit rough,especially because the season
(18:56):
didn't start out how Inecessarily wanted to and I was
just kind of still mad aboutthat.
But now I got no problem withit.
I get the puck and then, if Ireally wanted to, I could just
skate it up or just make it good, you don't win last night's
game if you're not playingdefense.
Speaker 5 (19:09):
Yeah, I'm serious, it's not even close, yeah.
Speaker 6 (19:19):
I mean, the team definitely helped there.
Uh, yeah, it's, it's something.
Hey, everybody has a role toplay.
Yeah, and tyler, what's thatlike for you to see one of your
buddies, one of your teammates,kind of be selfless, right, and
really thinking about the teamfirst and making a move like
that?
Speaker 1 (19:27):
I mean it's super awesome to see that we have guys
on the bench that are willingto do stuff and put the team
first.
Crew especially.
Especially moving back to d, Imean I've played my fair share
of d when I was a little kid,but it's nothing like what he's
doing now, being able to havethe skills that he has on the
back end, especially as aforward, being able to get out
of the zone.
You have confidence, knowingthe puck's going to go where he
(19:49):
wants it to go coach you want tospeak to that.
Speaker 5 (19:52):
There was some late third period last night.
There was a lot of pressuredeep in our zone, right.
Anyway, it was intense and thisguy here is getting the puck
out a lot.
I mean it was, it was tough buthe was getting it done.
What's it like having him backthere yeah, I mean it's, it's
great.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
I mean it was probably the one of the better
things we've done this year isputting him back there.
Uh, I mean he probably we playthe game 51 minutes and crew Kru
probably logs like 40.
Speaker 5 (20:19):
That was my next question.
It's awesome.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Like I said, early in the year, we struggled really
bad of getting pucks out of thezone.
Since we put Kru back there, hehas the capability of finding
that time and finding the guysout.
When we're stretching wings.
He's able to put the puck ontheir stick.
Like you said, he can get thepuck out when needed.
It's been awesome to see him doit.
Speaker 5 (20:40):
Just watching it, I think it's even as a.
If I'm on the other team as aforward going in, I'm like, oh,
this guy, I know this guy hasoffensive skills.
So it changes even you as aforward going into forecheck,
because you'll just do a sharpturn and head the other
direction like nothing, right.
Not every defenseman does that.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Right.
It just shows that he has thepuck skills and the skating
skills right, so it goes a longway with us.
Speaker 6 (21:03):
It's all about time in the lab, yeah.
Speaker 5 (21:07):
Without the lab, where would we?
Be, Tyler, I have someapologies to make for you.
I announced lacrosse over thelast few years and I've always
said noblet, so my apologies.
It's Tyler Noblet, so myapologies.
It's Tyler Noblet everybody,but you're also a lacrosse
player.
One thing I noticed about youlast night other than you're
great, you know, coming backfrom injury, your unique
(21:27):
face-off style is reallysomething to behold.
I mean, I maybe I'm wrong onthis, but you hold that stick
like 90 degrees.
It's almost like straight down.
Where'd you learn that?
Speaker 1 (21:38):
I'm gonna be 100% honest.
I learned like my sophomoreyear.
My dad pulled up a video ofdylan larkin taking face offs
and just trying to be aggressiveget as low as possible, put
your head in the center of thedot and I was like, hey, maybe
I'll try it.
And it ended up working out forme.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
So coach, that's not common to take draws like that.
Speaker 2 (21:53):
I haven't seen before of you or even around hockey
more than me, but I mean you cantake them as long as you're
winning.
I'm like whatever works for you, works for you, but yeah,
there's certain ways you cantake them, but as long as we're
winning the face-offs like, I'mnot gonna.
If it's not broke, don't fix it.
Speaker 5 (22:05):
So yeah, yep, you have a unique uh story too, for
starting uh, when you were alittle fellow, you guys used to
live out in muskegon.
Talk about you know kind of howyou became familiar with hockey
as a little kid.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Oh, I remember my parents have always been super
close around hockey.
They both went to MichiganState and Michigan State was
pretty dominant in hockey atthat time.
So always when I would be justI mean I was like two, three,
four years old there'd always behockey on the TV.
And I remember just wanting tosee, get mini sticks or go to a
game or at least put skates on.
(22:39):
And I remember my first actualexperience with hockey is we
have a little cottage up inMuskegon, yeah, and we went over
there and it's on the lake.
It's super like in the woodslake, like not very good ice.
And I remember going over therewith a shovel and I told my
dad's like hey, dad, I needskates, I need to try this.
And I mean I couldn't getskates, I need to try this.
(22:59):
And I mean I couldn't getskates right then and there and
then I kept pushing him andpushing him.
But eventually, like a year,year and a half later, he got me
skates and straight to learn toskate and instantly fell in
love.
Speaker 5 (23:10):
Yeah, once you get familiar with getting on the ice
and hitting the ice I know Igrew up with a lot of hockey
players and it's just like whenyou get on the ice it's just the
best feeling, isn't it, coach?
I mean, is it kind of a thingfor you?
Speaker 2 (23:21):
growing up too.
Oh yeah, I mean.
I love being at the rink likeit was.
If you're having a good day,bad day, like you get an hour,
two hours at the rink andnothing else really matters.
You get to hang out with yourbuddies, or just being on the
ice is awesome, and that's why Ienjoy coaching so much.
It's great being able to comehere if you have a bad day at
work, or even a good day.
Just being here with the boysis a lot of fun.
(23:42):
Look forward to it every day.
Speaker 5 (23:44):
There was an alumni game a little while ago.
What maybe a month or so ago?
Yeah, about.
Her coach laced up and wasplaying.
He can still hold his own, youguys?
What's he like?
Speaker 1 (23:54):
Oh my goodness, yeah, he can definitely hold his own
against us.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
Yeah, I don't know.
I talked to my mom after andshe kept wondering who was on
the ice, because I think he hadthe Max Schwartz jersey on from
last year and she just kepttalking to me wondering who it
was and I told her it was Tom,and yeah, I mean he's fine.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yeah, I've definitely lost a touch or two and just
getting older and a little bitwider.
Yeah, I mean, we all get that,but at age 30, you still got
most of it Trying to keep upwith these guys.
Speaker 6 (24:25):
So we have a real family affair going on with
hockey right now.
Tyler probably nobody more thanyou, right, because your mom
and dad are also helping to runthe hockey program right now you
know the administrative stuff,making sure chuck a puck gets
taken care of.
What's that experience beenlike?
To kind of bring them along andhave them be a part of your
(24:48):
senior year.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
Oh my goodness, it's such like it's just a part of
our family.
It's something that we can allrelate to and all tie together
on.
It's so cool, especially havingmy younger brother, ethan, on
the team.
It's super cool to see himprogress and accelerate and
learn to love the game and makenew friends.
And then having mason uh, alsoplaying ice dogs be in the
(25:09):
stands and just be supportiveand seeing my mom wear my jersey
.
It's just.
It's such that it ties ourfamily together so well and I
absolutely love it yeah, it wasa real long road to get here.
Speaker 5 (25:20):
You guys mentioned the Ice Dogs a few times.
Did you guys play together alot growing up?
I mean, you're what?
A year apart, so what's thatlike for you guys?
Speaker 1 (25:28):
We played together a couple years maybe two years but
we're both born in 2007.
So we ended up being on thesame Ice Dogs team most of the
time, or at least in the sameage group.
Speaker 5 (25:39):
How many games a year with Ice Dogs?
Speaker 3 (25:42):
I think it was around 50, I think for most seasons,
and then playoffs wouldsometimes lead it to more, but I
think around 50.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
Around 50, and then you'd have some tournament
weekends that would go a littlefurther than 50.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
This must feel like a light schedule to you guys.
Speaker 3 (25:58):
Yeah, but the games are a lot more intense.
Speaker 5 (26:01):
Yeah, a little.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Just what you get from it.
Just taking all the hits andplaying as much, it definitely
takes a bigger toll on your body, for sure, yeah the high school
game tends to be prettyphysical.
Speaker 6 (26:13):
Yeah, right, and that's why we don't see a ton of
freshmen really play highschool hockey.
We have one on our roster, isthat right, coach?
Oh, three, we're young.
What is it like, kind ofintroducing those younger
players into the world of highschool hockey, where kids are a
little bit bigger and they'regoing to be a little bit more
aggressive?
Speaker 2 (26:33):
Yeah, yeah, it's, um, I think we're probably probably
one of the youngest high schoolteams, honestly, I mean.
But that's that's kind of whatwe, what we have right now, just
with.
I think we had what maybe 18,19 guys try out for our team
this year and we've we'vestarted with 17 and then connor
got hurt, then we're at 16, sonow we're back to 17.
(26:54):
So, yeah, I mean to be able totry and compete like the younger
guys.
You got to get them in earlyand get their feet wet.
They've all been great for us.
They've been, honestly, almostin every other shift Between
Aiden and Eli and Connor.
They play a ton.
It's good to see the young guysgetting in there and actually
contributing to the team.
Speaker 6 (27:16):
You guys spent a lot of time with Frank through the
offseason up in the weight room.
What is that, tyler?
Maybe you can speak to thisfirst.
What has that done for you?
As the season has gone on, haveyou seen the benefits of all of
that strength training in theoffseason?
Speaker 1 (27:31):
yeah, I mean definitely the boys have gotten
a little bit stronger.
Um, I feel like, adding on tothat, it's brought us together
to be more of a family and unitebecause we're all up, like when
we would do our lifts it'd bereally early, like 637 in the
morning, and nobody wants to getup at 630 in the morning,
especially in the summer and tosee everyone turn out and want
(27:51):
to be a part of this family.
It really brought everyoneclose together because we're
going through the hard timestogether and that's super
special to see.
Speaker 6 (27:59):
Yeah, that's the Dawn Patrol right there.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Yeah, and I think for me it's been yeah, a lot of the
team stuff with Frank.
Like we were just in theretoday and we hit a light lift
and then Frank was in thewrestling room with us and we
did like 20 minutes ofstretching and meditation.
So I mean he's been greatbecause he knows everything to
do.
But also, like I think when Iwas playing in MDHL, one thing I
kind of noticed was my speedwasn't where it was, wasn't
(28:23):
where it needed to be, I'll sayjust playing with all those
Detroit guys.
And then I texted Frank andsaid I was just looking to get
faster and he legit sent me likea 10-step routine of
plyometrics and I did them forthe entire fall after that and
then I've definitely seenprogress in my speed since then.
So I mean he's great.
Speaker 6 (28:44):
Coach.
That's Darren's role, right,Like he tends to be the coach in
the weight room with the guys.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
Yeah, him and I both were going in the summer near
the end of summer when the ruleskind of kick in and stuff like
that.
Yeah, darren pretty much tookover from there.
But yeah, we just did early inthe morning.
So I think we started at 6 30and that way.
That way these guys can havethe rest of the day and that way
I don't get in trouble at work.
I can actually get to theoffice at a decent hour.
Speaker 6 (29:10):
So I guess that's another thing I'd be interested
to hear from you about.
What is it like kind ofjuggling this full-time you're
full-time professional andtrying to be there for the boys
and the team and practiceschedules and all of that is
that.
What is that like during thehockey season for you?
Speaker 2 (29:27):
it's chaotic, for sure, um, but no, it's, I love
it, like I wouldn't.
I wouldn't be doing this if Ididn't love it, um, but yeah,
it's, it's definitely a lot,working 40, 50 hours a week and
then coming to the rink.
So I go, go from work to therink, sometimes back to work,
but no, it's, I wouldn't changeit, I love doing it and these
guys make it special and we havea.
(29:48):
We have a good group in theroom this year and not too many
issues and we get the business.
But then outside of the rink,like, we have a good time and,
like I said, I love doing ityeah, let's talk about some
other players on the team.
Speaker 5 (30:01):
Maybe let's talk about your goalie First of all.
Yeah, let's talk about WillNagerwort for a second, because
he is really fun to watch Frommy perspective.
Last night, during the thirdperiod, I kind of stood behind
the net and there was a fewsaves that he made, I'm like,
and that was elite.
There was one blocker save thathe made real late.
That puck was heading rightinto that top corner and he got
it.
Tyler, if you want to starttalk about Will a little bit.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
I mean, Will and I have been super close for super
long.
Him and I seriously, we liveeight houses apart.
So every single day we go andeither I'll take him to school,
he'll take me to school, andit's seriously like family.
My family loves his family I'massuming his family loves my
family.
But I mean, I absolutely lovebeing around, will you seem
fairly pleasant?
Oh, I mean, I love spendingtime with Will.
(30:45):
I sit right next to him in thelocker room and all we do is
joke around.
It's great.
Speaker 5 (30:49):
And, as a hockey goalie crew, what's he like to
have back there?
Speaker 3 (30:53):
Oh yeah, I mean, he's definitely pretty special, he's
definitely gifted and I don'tthink our team is as good
without him.
He's definitely kept us inclose games and kept not so
close games pretty close yeah.
Speaker 6 (31:06):
Have you guys seen him hit a golf ball?
Speaker 3 (31:08):
Oh yeah, he's elite too.
Speaker 6 (31:11):
Oh he's legit.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
I played with him this summer.
He beat me.
Speaker 6 (31:15):
He's legit.
He'll lead our team in thespringtime here.
He's a really good golfer.
How?
Speaker 5 (31:20):
far is he hitting off the team?
Speaker 2 (31:22):
Farther than me.
Speaker 6 (31:24):
He puts it out there.
Speaker 1 (31:25):
He puts it out there.
I've seen him hit 300 before,yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Yeah, willie's awesome.
He's definitely the backbone orthe heart and soul of our team.
Like Cruz said, he's definitelywon us some games, especially
last year.
Just only being a sophomore andpretty much playing every game,
I think he ended up playinglike 22 and a half of our 25 and
, yeah, he stole probably fouror five of those games himself
and then this year like, yeah,he's, he's been awesome.
(31:51):
It's I mean, we had to rely onhim every game.
We only have one, so he's uh.
Speaker 5 (31:55):
Like I said, he's uh yeah, I was checking out that
team picture.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
I didn't see a second set of pads anywhere we have
two younger guys that willpractice with us, so that way we
have two to three goalies everypractice.
Speaker 6 (32:08):
Yeah, so we opened up the podcast today with a little
electric guitar star spangledbanner.
There's another guy, and youknow, hockey is one of those
unique sports where a lot ofprograms are electric guitar
Star Spangled Banner.
There's another guy.
Hockey is one of those uniquesports where a lot of programs
are co-op.
You've got multiple schoolscoming together.
Can you talk a little bit aboutCharlie Moncoun, our Black
(32:30):
River representative, and whathe brings to the team other than
those luscious locks?
Speaker 3 (32:35):
I know he's pretty special.
He's a big PK guy, he's aworkhorse like.
He gets hit probably just asmuch as tegan and he draws
penalties, like if you want apower play, you got to put
charlie out there and he'll drawyou one.
But yeah, he's a character, forsure he's.
I mean one time my car uh shutdown here at the rink and he
jump started in with hiselectric guitar yeah, maybe but
(32:57):
no, uh, I I would have no idea.
He knows everything and he's asenior and I talk to him a lot
and he gives me pretty goodadvice, so he's great.
Speaker 5 (33:07):
Yeah, you've got some other seniors on the team,
right, so we've got Aarons.
We just talked about Charlie.
How about Moore?
He's graduating this year.
Are you good friends with himtoo?
Speaker 1 (33:21):
I mean you guys all are close.
Yeah, ethan moore is seriouslya brother from another mother.
Speaker 5 (33:23):
He was seriously.
There's always one.
As long as you have somebody inyour life that is that guy.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
It's a good thing like seriously, just today we
had the workout with frank andhe called I'm driving home, I'm
going to walgreens to go buy aknee brace.
He calls me and goes hey, can Icome over to your house for a
little bit?
Go shoot some pucks.
And I was like, yeah, sure Iwon't be there.
And then, not thinking anythingof it, I didn't see his car in
the driveway and I called himand was like, hey, did you come
(33:47):
over?
He's like, yeah, I was at yourhouse by myself and I was just
shooting pucks and I left beforeyou got back.
So hopefully that out of ourhouse he's just another kid in
our family.
I absolutely love being aroundEthan.
He's super funny.
Speaker 6 (34:04):
We touched on it a little bit earlier about the
brotherhood that is within theprogram right now.
Dan Diodana from the HollandSentinel did a really nice
article for us a couple of weeksago talking about all the
combination and the brothercombos.
All three of you are part ofthat combination Coach combos.
You guys are well, all three ofyou are are part of that
combination coach.
Maybe you can give us a starthere.
What has that been like, kindof not only coaching with your
(34:28):
brother but then coaching a teamthat has so many brother combos
within it?
Speaker 2 (34:32):
yeah, it's uh.
I could talk about the teampart first.
I've never been anything, I'venever had anything like it.
I've I played on teams where weonly had maybe one set of
brothers.
So seeing this is prettyspecial, it's crazy.
It's a half-hour roster, it'sjust brothers.
And then, yeah, being able tocoach my brothers, it's
different Like I've never.
We've always missed each otherby a year.
(34:53):
We're four years apart, butwe're also four grades apart.
So we never.
In high school I graduated, hebecame a freshman and then in
college we both went to GrandValley, but I had graduated and
then he came in to Grand Valley.
So, yeah, we just missed eachother by a year.
I mean, we grew up playinghockey with each other down in
the basement and stuff like that, but we never actually did
(35:15):
anything hockey-related in anorganization.
So having him is pretty cool.
He definitely gets the shortend of the stick between myself
and Darren because he's mybrother, so it's a little bit
easier to snap on him than tosnap on a couple of other people
.
Speaker 5 (35:34):
You can always go at your brother no questions asked,
because you've done it beforeand you'll do it again and
tomorrow will be just fine,right, right, yeah.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
So there's been a couple incidents the last two
years with that, but he takes itwell and he just moves on.
Speaker 5 (35:48):
All right.
So we've got you and yourbrother Crew.
You have you and Cray.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
Yep.
Yeah so I think it's definitelybeen pretty cool.
I think he's progressed thisyear for sure, just gaining more
confidence, but like just thewhole team wise with the
brotherhood.
I think it helps with chemistryso much because we all know
each other so well and like justto have a guy you can kind of
rely on, just because you knowhim so well, definitely helps.
Speaker 1 (36:12):
Yeah, I mean to tie into that like everyone's in a
super good mental space thisyear.
I feel like everyone's got agood friend to sit with at lunch
, everyone's got someone to talkto and I feel like outside of
the rink that's super, superimportant.
But going into more me andEthan's relationship, I feel
like especially the car rideshome even after like a bad game
or even a good game.
I remember the first game hescored on the road.
(36:34):
I remember sitting in the truckand just going crazy or playing
some music, told dad we weregonna go get ice cream it was
super awesome to just have himin the car and just know like,
hey, we're living in the samehousehold, we're sleeping under
the same roof, like that'ssomeone to be proud of, so yeah
that's awesome.
Speaker 5 (36:49):
And then also, as you got, uh, nate and eli bean and
then connor and aiden reedy, soit's, it's really something.
You know what I?
Uh, I hadn't watched you playthis year until I went to the
jenison game, and what's reallyfunny is that it stood out there
.
So, as I mean, I'm not lookingat a program, I think I'm like,
wait a minute.
I saw that name twice, I sawthat name again, I saw that name
again.
(37:09):
It was like the same names keptrepeating themselves.
Then I pull out the program.
Sure enough, it's, everybody'sgot a brother on the team.
It's pretty crazy, crazy.
Let's get into the some of thefun things about hockey, cause
hockey has so many really fun,cool things that are kind of
part of the culture.
First we're going to go to thehair, which is also known I
think I'm I'm an old guy, so ifI'm wrong on this, let me know
(37:31):
but it's also known as the flowor the lettuce.
Yeah, who has the best hair onthe team?
Best hair?
Speaker 3 (37:40):
Best hockey hair.
Speaker 5 (37:41):
We'll go hockey hair first.
Hockey hair Is there anybodybut Charlie?
I mean yours comes out of yourhelmet crew a little bit, I was
watching last night I could seeit.
Speaker 1 (37:50):
Yeah, I mean, if Will wore a player helmet, he'd have
the best hair.
That's my opinion.
Speaker 5 (37:54):
Oh, no, kidding yeah.
Speaker 3 (37:56):
And then I got a shout out to the freshman.
I got to go, eli Bean.
That middle part's pretty sick.
I will say, oh, he's got themiddle part, yeah, he's got it.
Speaker 5 (38:02):
No, kidding it looks nice.
All right, all right, so a fewdifferent ones there.
Another part of hockey, ofcourse, is suits on game day.
You guys do that regularly,coach.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Yeah, for the most part, much wears a suit every
day.
Speaker 3 (38:15):
yeah, yeah, on the home games we do suits, and then
on the away games we do likepretty much the same stuff.
It's just a woe jacket insteadof a suit.
Speaker 6 (38:22):
Oh, that's pretty nice, yeah, and who suits in the
in the building over the years?
Like dudes go all out likethey're just not throwing a suit
on, like they are getting afterit.
I mean some necklaces, yeah, isit?
Speaker 5 (38:37):
there's no need to look bad if you're putting a
suit on, especially hockeyplayers.
There's a lot that goes on withhockey and having that suit on
for hockey is sweet.
Who does the suit the best onthe team coach in your opinion.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
I don't know.
A lot of guys have some goodones.
I'll give Kru some credit.
He rocks the floods a littlebit at the bottom, so show off
the ankles.
Speaker 6 (39:04):
Nice.
Is that just because youhaven't upgraded your pant game
I?
Speaker 3 (39:09):
would say mostly my mom.
She doesn't really like it whenthe pants are too high on me,
so leave it at that.
I don't think it looks too bad.
I guess Coach kind of likes ittoo Good style.
Speaker 5 (39:21):
There's a lot of tradition hockey too with
pregame meals putting onequipment, taping your stick.
What do your guys go to mealspregame?
Speaker 1 (39:29):
Every single game, jimmy John's, jimmy John's
sandwich and a bag of chips.
It's like seriously, you go askany one of the brothers on the
team like every single kid walksinto the rink with jimmy johns
every single kid, yeah and Ithink I gotta shout out to my
mom here.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
She's a great cook, so pretty much whatever she
makes for me I'll eat.
But uh, we've been going withchicken alfredo for this season.
It's been been working prettywell, I'd say.
Speaker 2 (39:51):
But yeah, I mean shout out to her you're gonna
talk about your lunchbox at all,or?
Speaker 3 (39:56):
oh yeah.
Yeah, she makes me a prettygood lunch too.
It keeps me fueled for the day,but yeah, she's great.
Gotta love moms, man, yeah mangotta love moms.
Speaker 5 (40:04):
Anybody quirky with uh, you know, stick taping or
the order putting on equipment.
You notice anything like that,coach?
Anybody quirky that way?
Speaker 2 (40:11):
no, I I kind of stay out of the room when the boys
are in there.
I think that's important forthem to have their time together
and, um, like our, our coachingoffice is on the other side of
the hall so we're quite far away, and then for game times and
stuff like that.
the coaches pretty much hang outon the outside.
We give these boys some spaceand it's good for them to have
an hour to themselves and closedoors and just talk as a group
(40:33):
and just be younger guys andhave some fun in the room.
Speaker 5 (40:39):
That's pretty cool that you do that, you guys.
That's is that.
Does every coach do that?
Speaker 3 (40:44):
uh, I don't necessarily know, but it
definitely gives us time to likementally lock in, I would say,
just because we just focus onwhatever we're thinking about.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
But yeah, I mean, yeah, there's some coaches that
do that, but with the equipmentdressing, there's some guys that
have their routines.
Like Kyler Comet's got to bedressed 30 minutes before the
game no kidding.
Speaker 2 (41:04):
Every single game.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
He walked out of the room yesterday before any of us
even went into the room.
Speaker 5 (41:09):
He's got full gear on .
Speaker 2 (41:10):
Yeah, the guy gets dressed in like five minutes,
that's crazy Well he is a ballof energy, that's to say energy.
Speaker 6 (41:23):
That's a state of the least he was at.
Uh, you know, we started somestudent run um live streams now
and he's part of this kind ofgroup of kids in wobian that are
doing some live streams and hewas there for the first one the
other night.
Man bouncing off the wall, he'sgot a hundred ideas throwing
them at me.
I'm like kyler man, we gottaslow down.
This is the first live streamlike that's baby steps, baby.
Speaker 2 (41:40):
Is he on the penalty killing unit?
Yeah, he's out there, he's onthe PK.
Speaker 5 (41:44):
Yeah, that would help .
It's a good place for a guywith high energy.
Speaker 2 (41:47):
I'm not a big rah-rah guy myself, so I'm happy we
have Kyler.
Speaker 5 (41:54):
Well, you know what I noticed yesterday too.
Do you remember Jacques Demersway back in the day?
I know Red Wing coach butanyways but I you're sitting,
you're standing there and I meanit's getting hectic in the
third period, like they're inthe zone a lot.
There's a number of times whereit's like we couldn't you know
you couldn't clear the zone.
The puck staying in it's goodand you're like just very stoic,
taking your time Does.
(42:15):
Does his calmness calm you guysdown?
Speaker 3 (42:18):
yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
I mean to be honest, like 100%.
Honestly.
Speaker 3 (42:22):
I'm not really paying attention to Tom, I'm just kind
of doing my own thing, but Imean it's definitely okay, it's
definitely nice to not have himlike yelling at someone the
whole time, like getting onsomeone's butt about something
yeah, I think for sure likeespecially like when I make a
mistake it's better that he'smore calm and trying to help me
fix it, rather than justscreaming at me and telling me I
did bad.
So that's definitely prettyhelpful.
Speaker 5 (42:45):
Best shot on the team Tyler.
Who's got it?
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Crew Anderson for sure, I know 100% he's in the
lab.
Speaker 5 (42:51):
He's in the lab.
Two bucks, coach, best passer.
Yeah, probably knobs.
Hmm, nice, best skater crewwell true, 100%.
Speaker 2 (43:02):
We got some decent, we got some good guys.
Yeah, knobs good skater crew'sa good skater.
Give Eli Bean, yeah, there too,pretty quick.
I mean, yeah, I mean, if youcan't skate, you can't really
play no, you can't, you have toskate.
Speaker 6 (43:14):
Yeah, that's why I can't play hockey.
Yeah, you gotta.
Speaker 5 (43:16):
That's why I can't play hockey.
You've got to be able to skate.
Funniest guy on the team Kuro.
Who is it?
Speaker 3 (43:23):
In some moments I think I've got to give it to
Kyler just because he's the bigenergy guy.
He's always buzzing.
And then I think Tegan's prettyfunny and Kray has some good
one-liners.
He's kind of known around theroom as that.
He just randomly pops in, saysa quick one and he's out and
then we're all just laughingthat's pretty great if you can
pull off the one liner and leavethe room.
Speaker 2 (43:40):
Yeah, I'm gonna agree with the cray one.
Like last year, he didn'treally talk much.
It was hard to get him to openup, but even like, even like
we're trying to have like aserious meeting or something
along those lines he always, healways found a way to like kind
of slip in like a one-liner andI just couldn't keep myself from
laughing and he's really openedup this year.
There's more and moreone-liners coming out.
Speaker 6 (44:00):
He's hilarious Dirtiest locker.
Speaker 1 (44:05):
Ethan Moore.
Oh, my goodness, we got thesnack.
We got the refrigerator inthere with Gatorades.
Every single time it's oneempty Gatorade bottle.
Got some Goldfish wrappers inthere, or something?
Ethan Moore?
Speaker 3 (44:17):
He's pretty much got the trash can in his locker.
He's not been cleaning it toomuch, I'll say.
Speaker 5 (44:24):
There's lots of some other fun things of hockey.
Of course you've got your busrides, especially when you get a
charter.
That's always a great part ofhockey just chilling like that.
I always love the hockey teamphoto.
I played hockey when I was, Ithink, until about age 15.
But I always remember justhaving that team photo was
always really fun.
You guys got a great team photohere.
That's a pretty good one, yeah,I kind of look like a doofus.
Speaker 4 (44:44):
I don't know why.
Speaker 2 (44:44):
I wore a hat.
Oh, you do have the hat on.
Speaker 5 (44:47):
Your beard's not really in there either, is it?
Speaker 2 (44:50):
No.
Speaker 5 (44:50):
Or is it, Maybe it is .
Anyways, I always like thehockey team photo.
It was just kind of a greatthing.
It's a very weird thing to doas a hockey player to sit there
with your skates and your glovesand sit like that.
It's kind of weird.
Speaker 6 (45:02):
Last year's fake mustaches were some of my
favorite that I've ever seen ina photo.
Speaker 2 (45:07):
Worst things.
I've seen Waukes and BrondykeWaukes and Brondyke.
They had maybe five hairs ontheir lip and they took some
mascara to it.
Speaker 5 (45:18):
It was so good.
Oh, that's pretty classic.
There's one other thing I wantto do about hockey.
What, uh, being a fan of hockey, what a great part of what
hockey is the sounds of hockey.
There's not other sports thathave these sounds.
This is one of my favorite.
I mean, it's the horn.
(45:55):
You know it's a goal.
That's actually crew, that'syour goal versus jenison on
senior night actually.
Speaker 3 (46:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (46:00):
So that was pretty awesome.
Speaker 6 (46:02):
We comboed with Hope a couple of years ago to get the
horn in to try to add thatatmosphere to our home ice.
Speaker 2 (46:09):
Oh yeah, that's great .
Yeah, it's nice to hear when itgoes off.
Speaker 3 (46:12):
Yeah, it's definitely pretty cool.
I don't know many other highschools that have that and,
especially because it's justkind of ours, it's like the
sound you know when you hearthat sound, there's been a goal
scored for West Ottawa, so it'spretty cool.
Speaker 5 (46:22):
You know what's cool?
I was checking out on Spotifythe other day and I was going
just through.
Every like NHL team has adifferent style of horn.
Speaker 3 (46:33):
It's just a little bit different.
I didn't know that unique sound, but yeah, it's pretty cool to
have, for sure.
Speaker 5 (46:39):
Then you go to a neutral game yesterday and
there's nothing.
Yeah, it kind of just takesaway from the nature of hockey a
little bit.
Speaker 6 (46:47):
So this is the first year that we, as kind of OK
Conference, have come togetherand put this tournament together
.
From an AD's perspective, it'sa logistical nightmare because
we're trying to figure out bustimes like 12 hours before we
need a bus.
We've got to make sure that thehome team's got to provide the
trainer, the away team's got toprovide the scores table people,
(47:10):
so there's a lot of movingpieces.
What's it been like for youguys to kind of go through it
for the first time and have thiskind of tournament mentality?
Our thought was that it wouldprepare our teams better for
postseason.
Speaker 2 (47:22):
I really like it.
I think it's pretty cool.
It's a lot better than what wedid last year, right, like you
kind of just play your games andit's kind of over.
Now it kind of gives you achance to actually play for
something.
So I think it's good for ourgroup too, especially like Kruen
mentioned earlier.
We've left a lot on the tablekind of so far this season on a
couple of games, and now it kindof gives these guys something
(47:44):
to play for and gears us up forregionals right.
So I I like it a lot andhopefully they decide to keep
going with it yeah, I think Ithink it's here to stay.
Speaker 6 (47:53):
It's interesting to hear you guys, crew.
What do you, what do you thinkI?
Speaker 3 (47:55):
think it definitely helps, like our mindset, like
it's win only, like because ifyou lose, like you'll play, but
I mean you're out of thecontention for playing for
something.
And then that definitely leadsinto like regionals, for example
, where you just have to win, oryour season.
Speaker 1 (48:08):
So for sure that definitely helps I mean I just
love the mentality of, hey,we're gonna go play a tournament
, like, pack your bags, we'regonna go play, and I absolutely
love that.
And I also like that it's at adifferent rink and it's kind of
mutual.
So I do enjoy that, mostlybecause there's games before,
there's games after.
You can kind of see everythingthat's going on.
I love the atmosphere of it.
Speaker 6 (48:30):
And it's given us a great opportunity to avenge a
loss from earlier in the seasonagainst our rivals from up the
road, kind of.
What are your thoughts as we gointo that tomorrow night, coach
?
Speaker 2 (48:42):
My big one is going to be we've got to stay
disciplined.
We got ourselves in sometrouble in that game.
We went down early 3-0 withsome penalty trouble, and I
think if we clean that up we'llbe all right.
We went up, going down I thinkit was 5-1, and then we climbed
back 5-4.
And we had a chance to tie itand the crew actually put one
off the post with eight secondsleft.
(49:04):
So that goes an inch out of theway.
We tied it up 5-5.
And we take it to OT and maybegood things happen there.
But yeah, our big thing isgoing to have to stay
disciplined and just stick toour plan but stay out of the box
.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
I'm super excited for the Grand Haven game just
because I can't stand losing tosome of my good buddies Playing
Ice Dogs.
There's a lot of kids fromGrand Haven that played for the
Ice Dogs as well and it's kindof cool Got split up.
Some of the kids are at WestOttawa, some of the kids are at
Grand Haven.
It's like, hey, I'm playingagainst one of my good buddies
from up the street, so I can'tstand losing to them, so I would
love to beat them yeah, it'lldefinitely be pretty cool.
Speaker 3 (49:41):
I will say I didn't really have like the smartest
game wise.
I think I definitely got intosome of that discipline trouble,
that game, which definitelycosts us, but it'll be cool to
get some revenge, hopefully, andplay my game.
Speaker 5 (49:51):
So yeah, all right.
Well, let's get in close tohockey time.
It's uh 4 24.
You guys are both to have topull a Kyler comment to get on
ice by four 30, five minutes.
There's so much more we couldtalk about but we don't have
time.
But it was great sitting downwith the three of you.
A real pleasure to meet all ofyou, really really nice to do.
Just remember everybody, we areWest Ottawa, we are community,
(50:13):
we are each other.
Game um, this tournament willbe wrapped up and this will
probably air after that, butthere's more hockey coming up
and we wish you guys all thebest.
Speaker 1 (50:20):
Uh, moving forward so thanks for taking time with us,
thank you.
Thank you, guys, so much thanksguys.
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